I am so bored of the government saying crass things like 'we are going to have to get used to living with Covid'. This is, of course, used as an excuse for their policy of withdrawing government support for businesses this summer as they move towards a policy of austerity that is their plan as they try to shrink the role of government in the economy again.
Their logic, often stated, is that we will have to learn to treat Covid like 'flu. The implication is that if we can live with the deaths from ‘flu then we can live with the deaths from Covid. However, that assumes that the number of deaths from Covid are similar to those from flu. And they are not.
I am aware that it is often claimed that flu claims up to 25,000 lives a year. That is the implication of government reports like this which say:
This looks like serious numbers of ‘flu deaths. But note that title with care. ‘Associated' plays a big part in it, and is deeply misleading. I prefer this report, because it is accurate as to causes:
That report says:
Of all death occurrences between January and August 2020, there were 48,168 deaths due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) compared with 13,619 deaths due to pneumonia and 394 deaths due to influenza.
So, maybe 600 ‘flu deaths a year. Right now we have seen more than 150,000 Covid 19 deaths. Let's not pretend that there is any comparison or that because we can live with ‘flu deaths we can live with Covid deaths.
And, incidentally, the remaining deaths associated with ‘flu in the UK are aberrational when compared to places like Scandinavia. That's because the associated deaths are almost all pneumonia, and those deaths are heavily associated with fuel poverty. A report this week said a fifth of UK pensioners live in poverty. That's what causes those deaths. We need not live with them either. That's just government choice to let people die, just as it will be government choice to let people die from Covid.
We have tiny numbers of deaths from ‘flu a year in this country. Let's stop pretending otherwise. And let's stop pretending death imposed by government policy is acceptable.
Thanks for reading this post.
You can share this post on social media of your choice by clicking these icons:
You can subscribe to this blog's daily email here.
And if you would like to support this blog you can, here:
Government agnotology at work yet again.
If anyone doubts the impact of poor housing, have a chat with your local Housing Standards Officer – and make sure you’ve had a stiff whiskey before hand.
I think we can guarantee nothing will be done about the inequality exposed by the pandemic deaths.
By the way, we don’t have to live with flu deaths. They dropped enormously this year, because suddenly people were not taking their viruses to work and school and the shops with them, and when they couldn’t avoid going out, protecting their fellow citizens by wearing masks etc. But hey, the “freedom” not to wear a socialist mask is greater than the freedom not to catch your beastly cold, in tiny anglo saxon minds anyway.
Some rather sobering stats about pneumonia displayed as a map here: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/edn-20191112-1
The EU average in 2016 was 26 deaths per 100,000 people.
Three locations were called out as the worst in Europe, all above twice the average: most of Portugal (very much worse than Spain), parts of Poland, and parts of the UK (specifically, Wales and Lancashire).
But the UK was not ruled by a right wing dictatorship until the 1970s, or behind the iron curtain until 1990. So why are pneumonia deaths in the UK so very much worse than say France or Germany?
Poverty is the single word answer
My impression is that the Tory focus groups have identified what is an “acceptable” level of deaths for their voting base ( the useful idiots). The vaccination programme has achieved this, and that is all that is needed for them to continue their merry way.
There are more important matters out there after all, especially sausages (EU), wrecking British farming (Australia, US), keeping mates pockets full (industry subsidy policy).
I get your point, but in trying to justify it with numbers you are comparing apples with oranges. Flu is not a reportable disease which is routinely tested for in patients with respiratory infections, wheras Covid has been since early 2020.
In the older most vulnerable population, the condition that proves fatal is often pneumonia. That is almost always triggered by some prior respiratory infection, whether that be flu, a “common cold” virus, or latterly Covid. Basically, if all the deaths from pneumonia following Covid infection were classified just as pneumonia then there would (misleadingly) appear to be fewer Covid deaths; conversely if all the pneumonia deaths in a pre-Covid year had had the triggering respiratory virus identified by PCR (i.e. a reporting method comparable to Covid) there would have been a lot more flu deaths recorded.
There is indeed a public discussion to be had about what might be an “acceptable” death toll from Covid, and it is important to raise that. The same discussion doesn’t happen enough about other causes of death like flu, or road accidents, but in each case it needs the right data. And one has to remember that each of us is destined to die, and some cause will be identified to put on the death certificate.
My in-house doctor disagrees with you
Flu is not recorded as a cause of death because it almost never is
Covid clearly has been
When I see those claims that Covid is just like Flu I am reminder of my youth when there were posters everywhere warning that spitting would attract a fine (£5 if I remember correctly, which then was probably a working mans weekly wage).
It worked and TB was virtually eliminated.
Covid needs to be treated in the same manner, and that includes those who think the rules don’t apply to them.
Since the beginning of May, COVID deaths have been bumping along at around 10 to 15 per day, say 100 a week. So perhaps 5,000 to 6,000 in a year, if things stay the same, which of course they may not. Just for comparison, dementia was the leading cause of death in the UK in 2018, listed as the cause of death for around 78,000 people. https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/causesofdeath/articles/leadingcausesofdeathuk/2001to2018
The main risk, it seems to me, is that (yet again) the measures we are currently taking, including vaccinations, are clearly not keeping infections under control. If we allow infections to grow exponentially, the sheer weight of numbers may eventually create a significant number of people (albeit a small overall percentage) who need hospital treatment and then either die or suffer long term health consequences.
The higher the levels of infection the greater the number of new variants emerging, and the greater the risk that some will have enhanced transmissability and/or tolerance of existing vaccines protection. That’s just evolution at work.
I would just like to point out that we all have to die sometime. The vast majority of people with dementia will also be old. Ditto people who may die from flu.
So far Covid appears to be more dangerous for older people, but the Delta variant is definitely also proving fatal for some young people, so at this stage we cannot assume the deaths will be mainly in the older – due to die soon, population. We also have no idea how many deaths we can expect once we have the “learn to live with it ” scenario as thus far we have had a series of lockdowns and mask and distancing measures.
Ok, so let us change that. We must learn to live with Covid like we do with pneumonia.
Now what?
The figures show that ‘something’ was killing upwards of 30,000 people in some years and I do not remember you making a fuss back then. Probably no bandwagon around then for you to jump on.
And what is your answer? Lockdown forever? What are you proposing? Fine if you can earn a living staying indoors but you seem content that shop workers and delivery drivers take what you deem to be an unacceptable risk for yourself. What a selfish attitude.
What baffles me about comments like this is that the answers ar call in what I have already written
What baffles me is how you would think that is an answer to my questions.
You say “living with Covid” is not the answer. What is your answer? You do not say.
You say that we are unlocking too early. Why are you happy that shop workers and delivery drivers and many others who cannot make a living sat on a sofa and who you know doubt rely on are taking risks you say are too great for yourself?
If you want to spend the rest of your life hiding indoors, that is your choice. If others choose to accept the now small risk posed by Covid, in order to live their life fully why should they not do so? Those of you who want to hide, carry on hiding.
I am not sure what you mean by living with Covid
It is easily imaginable that the NHS will be overwhelmed again, and may be many times more if we just ‘live with Covid’
Do you think people will do that?
Do you think that they accept that risk?
Why should they? We could do so much better. We should have. It seems that Europe has. Why do we want to suffer this torment when it is clear we need not? What does living with it mean when it simply means disruption, economic chaos, and ill health for many? What sort of choice are you suggesting? And why? Especially when it is so apparent that this is not necessary?
As I understand it, Pneumonia often occurs when a person is already dying. Ambiguous deaths are sometimes labelled as pneumonia.
https://thorax.bmj.com/content/68/Suppl_3/A83.1
It is what eventually kills
Old age and a failing body does the rest
But there is ample evidence that this has much to do with poverty
I say this out of genuine curiosity as I have no idea what the answer is but…
How can this all end?
We have vaccinations which clearly are helping.
The virus may mutate to become more – or ideally less infective.
We could do a lot to improve living and working conditions which would not only reduce transmittion but improve health across the board.
But we cant stay in lockdown forever – for social rather than economic reasons
I have no idea how this will end
But it will not end where we began. That is my point. This is the start of a period of massive change. The belief that this ends may be the biggest mistake of all.
“because our vaccination programme is so poor “
Out of interest.,So poor to who exactly?will be interesting tp your supporting evidence?
You noted my comments?
This article suggests otherwise
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/06/22/flu-pneumonia-deaths-now-ten-times-higher-covid/
We know this was a lull between variants
You think that when cases are growing massively now that prices anything?
The link between cases and deaths has been broken through vaccinations. And booster jabs are already being planned in Sept. The Govt have really knocked the ball out of the park with their vaccine rollout.
That would be great if it were true
Cases are growing at more than 6% a day now
Claim what you like. This government also claims Brexit is a success and there is no border in the Irish Sea. Neither of those claims are true either
The data on which that new report is based are here. https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/deathsregisteredweeklyinenglandandwalesprovisional/weekending18june2021
Essentially, in England and Wales, we have around 1500 (summer) to 3000 (winter) deaths each week “involving pneumonia and influenza”. About 20,000 each year (more for the whole UK of course). Deaths “due to” influenza and pneumonia are much lower – typically around 300 per week. Deaths where “pneumonia and flu” were a contributing factor jumped up well above the five year average in the worst weeks of the pandemic in March/April 2020 and December 2020/January 2021.
The UK is not very good at tackling pneumonia. https://statistics.blf.org.uk/pneumonia For example, the poorest quintile (20%) of the population are about 50% more likely to develop pneumonia than the richest.
The last pint is key
The link that Andrew helpfully provided showed that you are more likely to get pneumonia and die if you are on relative low income. But it also showed that the richest can still die of pneumonia – they are 2/3rds as likely to die as those on the lowest income, but they can still die.
How do you square endorsing that helpful information with your earlier claim that poverty causes the pneumonia deaths?
It seems to me that if we define relative low income as being in the bottom half then poverty is a good predictor of at best 1/6th of the total deaths. From the link from Andrew which you approved. Furthermore, the differences in early death mortality across income groups are greater for many other causes of death than pneumonia.
I have looked at that data
I can see no link between flu deaths and socioeconomic grouping in the data
Maybe I missed the link, but I searched for the evidence (albeit briefly, but using normal techniques) and did not find it
Now, no one denies the rich can die of pneumonia but using no data at all you are making a claim much research contradicts
I think your time here is over: I strongly suspect trolling and considerable time wasting
“Standard of living and pneumonia
Does your standard of living affect your chances of getting pneumonia in the UK?
In 2012, pneumonia was around 45% more common in the most deprived quintile of society than the least deprived. This difference has been fairly consistent over recent years. The one exception is during 2009, when the incidence for the overall population is greater.”
This is about catching pneumonia. Deaths are a subset, of course. But I would not be at all surprise to hear that people in the lowest quintile are more likely to die if they catch pneumonia, as well as more likely to catch it in the first place.
Nearer the beginning “In 2012, 345 people for every 100,000 had one or more episodes of pneumonia” and then “In the period 2001—10, 214 people for every million died from pneumonia in the UK”.
So, something like 350 per 100,000 catch pneumonia each year, and perhaps one in fifteen of them (about 20 in 100,000) die. The EU stat suggests it is worse than that in 2016.
This feels like the sort of topic where there will be proper peer-reviewed epidemiological research, beyond factoids cherry-picked from websites.
Danny Dorling gas done peer reviewed work on this
There are links on this blog, somewhere
Agreed Richard. Approx 8% of infected children apparently get long covid, and there is still much uncertainty about the damage covid inflicts (respiratory, cognition, brain damage, etc) . Govt. seems to have been obsessed by various versions of ‘let it rip to create herd immunity’ since day one. ‘Children dont suffer’ is just the latest version. With measured infections running at 28K today -( as in late January) – and hospital admissions rising 10-15% per week(?) the policy seems to be to cook up a new more virulent variant. They are worried that people wont buy ‘Living with it’ and won’t ‘get back to normal’ – so Duncan Smith & Co . are now suggesting the daily infection rate should no longer be published!
Iain Duncan Donuts is a charlatan promoting policy intended to impose harm
The problem with lockdown is that it wasn’t fully observed by lots of people. And that was exacerbated by our sloppy international border, which didn’t mind letting various strains of the virus come into the country (and go out.)
The ongoing uncertainty is mainly caused by a half-hearted quasi-lockdowns, which only delayed the inevitable. The UK government shilly-shallied, wasted millions giving contracts to cronies who didn’t deliver, and is still refusing to provide the financial support people need to stay at home without losing their livelihoods or homes. Of course people are going to take risks, if the chance of catching Covid is set against the certainty of economic disaster. But, as Richard keeps pointing out, it didn’t need to be that way.
Of course many of us have fully observed the various lockdown periods, followed the rules set out by the devolved governments even more strictly than required. Some of us (who can afford to) have not been going out at all except for necessities, and have taken every precaution to ensure that workers who were keeping our lives ticking over didn’t catch it from us. But all you need are rampant sports fans, crowded beachgoers, etc, and all the personal and economic sacrifices we made over the past year and a half doesn’t count for much.
I feel we could have knocked this on the head a long time ago, if everybody had complied fully with masks and social distancing, the borders had been shut firmly at the outset, and the UK government had done more to mitigate the financial problems faced by ordinary people during this crisis.
Maybe if Boris & Co had not deliberately wasted millions on contracts to cronies that came to nothing, and invested in keeping the country’s businesses afloat instead? But they didn’t, and here we are, back to square one. Virus spiking, people scared… What’s it going to take?
This is what should happen next.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frtrjNaBW34
From the people’s covid enquiry, which is having a press conference next Wednesday at 13.00.
There is masses of evidence on that website. The enquiry is run by Michael Mansfield and has been going since February. You might find some very enlightening evidence among it.
Sorry, the time of the press conference has changed. It is now 11.30 to 12.30
The most extraordinary part of all this is the absence of transparency about treatments. The vaccines have been given emergency use authorisation on the basis that no readily available treatment exists. In the UK and many “high income” countries around the world, people are not offered early treatment for COVID despite the successful use of different low-cost, generic medicines in poorer countries— as such, the highest rates of covid deaths can be found in some of the richest countries. COVID is not like the ‘flu.