Average age of coronavirus fatalities

[SlugsTrout]

www.ons.gov.uk/aboutus/transparencyandgovernance/freedomofinformationfoi/averageageofthosewhohaddiedwithcovid19

That is all.

Not read the whole thread but you have missed the point of lockdowns OP. Taking emotion out of the equation for a minute the lockdowns were not designed to prevent deaths in this age category but in younger people. The fact that the ave age of people dying was high should actually be seen as a sign of the success of lockdown.
Ie the younger people who were seriously ill got treated in the nhs and survived- yes some will have long Covid which we also need to minimise.

It is actually a good sign that the average age of people who died is high. These are mainly the people who would have had more underlying health issues anyway and would not have survived the brutal treatment severe COVID requires.

Without lockdown we would have lost many many more younger people who we would not have had the capacity to treat as well as even more non Covid patients who couldn't access other services.

Your logic is completely upside down as you are using the positive result of a policy to question why the policy was put in place.

If you want a measure of how successful lockdown has been you need to look at those who did not die rather than those than those that did.

@Mumski45

Not read the whole thread but you have missed the point of lockdowns OP. Taking emotion out of the equation for a minute the lockdowns were not designed to prevent deaths in this age category but in younger people. The fact that the ave age of people dying was high should actually be seen as a sign of the success of lockdown. Ie the younger people who were seriously ill got treated in the nhs and survived- yes some will have long Covid which we also need to minimise.

It is actually a good sign that the average age of people who died is high. These are mainly the people who would have had more underlying health issues anyway and would not have survived the brutal treatment severe COVID requires.

Without lockdown we would have lost many many more younger people who we would not have had the capacity to treat as well as even more non Covid patients who couldn't access other services.

Your logic is completely upside down as you are using the positive result of a policy to question why the policy was put in place.

No, i think the OP is right that it shows elderly people are more susceptible to covid. They are.

Obviously more people catching covid through lockdown would mean more people of all ages dying. So yes, the number of younger people dying would increase but the average age probably wouldn’t change that much.

www.gponline.com/uk-covid-19-vaccination-programme-tracker/article/1704726

www.icnarc.org/DataServices/Attachments/Download/2d288f8e-728e-eb11-912f-00505601089b

commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn03336/#:~:text=Adult%20obesity%20in%20England,is%20classified%20as%20%27overweight%27.

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The purpose of the lockdown was to prevent deaths and I understand that, the likelihood of those under 60 without underlying health conditions ending up in hospital was small. We have locked up everyone not protect the more vulnerable groups and have therefore created a whole new vulnerable group - those who have suffered mental and ;physical health issues through the lockdown, sadly these are younger people. So now we have a huge crises with teenagers and young people which will last for years. We have now vaccinated the majority of the over 50s and we getting more normality as they aren't at such a high risk - why didn't we just ask those groups to isolate (most likely the over 65's/70s and vulnerable.) Interesting the allegation of ageism is so often applied to how we treat the old - but in this pandemic there has been ageism but to the young.

Interesting reactions to OP's post. Although the 'that is all' could have meant literally anything, most posters have chosen to interpret it as: 'that is all, I just don't care about elderly people dying.' Now, I don't know anything about this poster, but wow, are there some self-righteous responses on here.......

So: OP, thanks for that data. It is interesting, and actually I wanted to find some similar data myself - but struggled to find up to date versions of it. Thank you for informing us.

Disclaimer: I am not anti-vaxx, in fact am very pro-vaccine even before Covid (can't stand those who are against others like the MMR for example); I thought lockdown was needed (but way before Christmas); I think the most vulnerable in society should be protected (elderly, and young which for me includes unborn children) without prejudice, and I am completely, resolutely allergic to self-righteous bs like much of what has been posted above.

@NearlyAlwaysInsane yes, interestingly I interpreted it as ‘why are so many young/healthy people so scared of dying from this?’ and ‘why are we still dragging out lockdown when we’ve vaccinated the groups most likely to be seriously ill/die?’

@Abraxan

Also remember, those elderly and vulnerable people who did already die were also locked down alongside everyone else. It didn't work to prevent their deaths then, so why would it help them if it was only them locked down?

Look at care homes - locked down massively. That didn't work so successfully for many did it?

A lot of positive coronavirus patients were sent into care homes which clearly wasn’t going to protect them

@SlugsTrout but a 3 month lockdown on top of the year I've already done? Yes, a full year of shielding
And I'm not elderly, and yes I might die of flu or another infection

When people say "oh well people with underlying conditions, it's only them that die and can't they just shield.."
WE CAN HEAR YOU and are fully functioning members of society who also have young families and work

We should probably find out what’s killing all those people dying with Covid, not from it. There’s rather a lot of them. Whatever it is it only seems to happen when the number of Covid cases is high.

My cousin was 47, no underlying conditions. Two other people I know were in their 30’s. Take your stats and shove them up your arse.

[quote bumbleymummy]@NearlyAlwaysInsane yes, interestingly I interpreted it as ‘why are so many young/healthy people so scared of dying from this?’ and ‘why are we still dragging out lockdown when we’ve vaccinated the groups most likely to be seriously ill/die?’[/quote]
this

[quote QueenPaw]@SlugsTrout but a 3 month lockdown on top of the year I've already done? Yes, a full year of shielding
And I'm not elderly, and yes I might die of flu or another infection

When people say "oh well people with underlying conditions, it's only them that die and can't they just shield.."
WE CAN HEAR YOU and are fully functioning members of society who also have young families and work[/quote]
I’m not sure why these people think those of us with underlying conditions think we can’t read their posts.

@RafaIsTheKingOfClay

We should probably find out what’s killing all those people dying with Covid, not from it. There’s rather a lot of them. Whatever it is it only seems to happen when the number of Covid cases is high.

That has been identified hasn’t it hence shielding and vulnerable groups regardless of age?

Vascular diseases don’t do well at all with covid, diabetes is the one that springs to my mind but then there are considerations of how a chronic disease is managed and how stable it is. Uncontrolled but medicated diabetes advice will be different to stable diet managed diabetes.

Then you have anyone on immunosuppressants so a lot of immune disorders including Crohn’s disease, rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis etc alongside people receiving treatment for things like cancer or thyroid disorders.

Protecting the vulnerable isn’t as simple as ‘keep all over 80’s shielded’. When you have a high case rate you start seeing a rise in the above groups becoming very seriously ill and dying.

From the beginning it’s been understood that the statistics for serious illness/death are very low. The problem is that in a population of almost 70 million people a tiny percentage translates to a huge number.

@SymphonyofShadows

My cousin was 47, no underlying conditions. Two other people I know were in their 30’s. Take your stats and shove them up your arse.

No underlying conditions is not the same as no known conditions. Do you mind saying what their state of health was generally?

@twelly

The purpose of the lockdown was to prevent deaths and I understand that, the likelihood of those under 60 without underlying health conditions ending up in hospital was small. We have locked up everyone not protect the more vulnerable groups and have therefore created a whole new vulnerable group - those who have suffered mental and ;physical health issues through the lockdown, sadly these are younger people. So now we have a huge crises with teenagers and young people which will last for years. We have now vaccinated the majority of the over 50s and we getting more normality as they aren't at such a high risk - why didn't we just ask those groups to isolate (most likely the over 65's/70s and vulnerable.) Interesting the allegation of ageism is so often applied to how we treat the old - but in this pandemic there has been ageism but to the young.

It’s not a popular opinion but I agree. I know it doesn’t seem fair to those who are CEV - but surely locking down a smaller population is better than locking down EVERYONE?? It’s kind of a lose-lose really...

@SymphonyofShadows

My cousin was 47, no underlying conditions. Two other people I know were in their 30’s. Take your stats and shove them up your arse.

I’m sorry for your losses but you are trying to shut down a debate by being emotive. Your experiences are not representative of the whole population, however tragic they may be. Your situation doesn’t make the facts and statistics untrue.

From day one we should have put the money into effectively isolating the elderly and high risk. Most people aged 60-85ish live at home alone or as a couple, so that would’ve been easy to do. For the ones that lived with family, we should’ve spent the money on hotels for isolation - this would’ve also kept the hotel industry going. Without the youngish and healthy sat at home, the food delivery slots would’ve freed up for the elderly, so that wouldn’t have been the issue it was.

The rest of the population should’ve worked from home where possible, but the gyms, hairdressers, shops etc should’ve stayed open for them to use. Of course masks, hand gel, distancing etc would still be in place, but the number of businesses that have closed is tragic.

As for schools, they should’ve stayed open all along, but lessons conducted in marquees outdoors, or in the schools halls etc so distancing could be maintained with the windows wide open.

I was being a little facetious, cornetta. I largely work on the assumption that if excess deaths keep rising massively when we have large covid outbreaks, and most of those excess deaths happen to be in people that have recently tested positive with Covid it’s not entirely a coincidence and they didn’t just happen to die of something else whilst recently having had covid or with Covid nut the Covid was unrelated.

@RafaIsTheKingOfClay

We should probably find out what’s killing all those people dying with Covid, not from it. There’s rather a lot of them. Whatever it is it only seems to happen when the number of Covid cases is high.

And when the number of deaths from literally any other cause is at an all time low, including virtually zero flu. It's not rocket science.

Fair enough @RafaIsTheKingOfClay.

Unrelated: I find the whole tone of these kinds of posts distasteful. As much as I would like to think they’re purely out of concern for those who have suffered due to the repercussions of covid I’m unconvinced.

The anger and need to classify groups of people as more important than others whilst ignoring the myriad of reasons why things have happened the way that they have strikes me as looking for a group to focus blame on. It’s implausible to some that this is just a shit situation which we have little to no control over. There’s no ‘sacrificing’ of any generation over another, especially when we’re considering things like the average age of death. It’s not the lives of the very elderly we’re trying to save, we’re trying to protect the infrastructure for everyone including the young.

It’s ironic that we, as a country, have made some truly terrible decisions yet those who continue to deny the realities of the choices that had to be made have the luxury of pontificating that they were made in vain because they weren’t forced to face head on what the true impact of covid is. I haven’t come across anyone who’s come up close and personal with covid past the asymptomatic/mild end who talks like that.

I couldn’t agree with you more, cornetta.

Oh yes lock up the over 60s as approach

it's the over 50s plus all CEV that matter ... groups 1 to 9 are the minimum we need to protect... it doesn't work

Right at the start, the trust I work for thought about trying to send all the at risk staff to work from home. They had to rethink pretty quickly when that turned out to be between 1/3 and 1/2 the staff. And that was without taking weight into account. Which I think fits with something Whitty said about being 1/3 of the population being vulnerable and needing 2 doses of the vaccination before considering how we end things like social distancing and masks.

The problem is those third don’t live alone. Banning all visitors from care homes would be relatively easy to do but tough on both people living there and relatives. But you wouldn’t eradicate infection from staff or other necessary visitors such as maintaince people. Others will be living with partners/children going to work and school and bringing infections back into the home. And in order for it to work, you’d probably have to make it mandatory because if at risk people ignored it, while levels of virus were largely uncontrolled, then you’d end up with a huge bed capacity problem.