Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources
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This document analyzes COVID-19 mortality data in Ireland from March 2020 to March 2021 by comparing publicly sourced mortality statistics with official data. The analysis highlights discrepancies in mortality figures, emphasizing the advantages of using detailed death notices from rip.ie due to delays and low granularity in officially published statistics. It seeks to understand the complex factors contributing to variations in expected vs. actual deaths during the COVID-19 pandemic, acknowledging limitations and uncertainties within the analysis.
Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources
- 1. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources This analysis compares COVID-19 mortality statistics with mortality data derived from public data sources Alan McSweeney April 2021 http://ie.linkedin.com/in/alanmcsweeney
- 2. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 2 Contents Introduction ........................................................................................................................................................4 Notes on RIP.ie Web Site Data ............................................................................................................................4 Variations In Mortality Rates And Assessment Of COVID-19 Mortality................................................................7 COVID-19 Mortality Data....................................................................................................................................9 Mortality Analysis..............................................................................................................................................13 Conclusions ........................................................................................................................................................21
- 3. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 3 List of Figures Figure 1 – Differences Between CSO and RIP.ie Mortality Data............................................................................5 Figure 2 – Sample Model of Excess COVID-19 Deaths...........................................................................................8 Figure 3 – More Complex Model for Excess COVID-19 Deaths ..............................................................................9 Figure 4 – Daily Number Of Deaths From The Column TotalCovidDeaths And The Daily Deaths From The Column ConfirmedCovidDeaths ........................................................................................................................................11 Figure 5 – Daily Number Of Deaths From The Column TotalCovidDeaths, The Daily Deaths From The Column ConfirmedCovidDeaths And Their Difference .......................................................................................................12 Figure 6 –TotalCovidDeaths And Cumulative Deaths From The Column ConfirmedCovidDeaths............................12 Figure 7 – Daily Deaths For The Seven 13-Month Intervals from Mar 2014 To Mar 20201 From RIP.ie...............14 Figure 8 – Average Daily Deaths For Intervals From 2014 To 2020 And Deaths From Mar 2020 To March 2021 From RIP.ie.......................................................................................................................................................14 Figure 9 – Range of Daily Deaths For Intervals From 2014 To 2020 And Deaths From Mar 2020 To March 2021 From RIP.ie.......................................................................................................................................................15 Figure 10 – Daily Deaths From Mar 2020 To March 2021 And The Sum Of The Average Daily Deaths From 2020 To 2021 From RIP.ie And COVID-19 Deaths .....................................................................................................16 Figure 11 – Range Of Daily Deaths From Mar 2014 To Mar 2020 And The Sum Of The Average Daily Deaths From 2020 To 2021 From RIP.ie And COVID-19 Deaths....................................................................................17 Figure 12 – Ranges Of Daily Deaths For Mar 2014 To Mar 2020 and Mar 2014 To Mar 2021 ................................17 Figure 13 – Ranges Of Daily Deaths For Mar 2014 To Mar 2020 and Mar 2014 To Mar 2021 And The Sum Of The Average Daily Deaths From 2020 To 2021 From RIP.ie And COVID-19 Deaths..................................................18 Figure 14 – Ranges Of Daily Deaths For Mar 2014 To Mar 2021 And The Sum Of The Average Daily Deaths From 2020 To 2021 From RIP.ie And COVID-19 Deaths .............................................................................................19
- 4. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 4 Introduction This document compares published COVID-19 mortality statistics for Ireland with publicly available mortality data extracted from informal public data sources. This mortality data is taken from published death notices on the web site www.rip.ie. This is used a substitute for poor quality and long-delayed officially published mortality statistics.1 Death notice information on the web site www.rip.ie is available immediately and contains information at a greater level of detail than published statistics. There is a substantial lag in officially published mortality data and the level of detail is very low. However, the extraction of death notice data and its conversion into a usable and accurate format requires a great deal of processing. The objective of this analysis is to assess the accuracy of published COVID-19 mortality statistics by comparing trends in mortality over the years 2014 to 2020 with both numbers of deaths recorded from 2020 to 2021 and the COVID-19 statistics. It compares number of deaths for the seven 13-month intervals: 1. Mar 2014 - Mar 2015 2. Mar 2015 - Mar 2016 3. Mar 2016 - Mar 2017 4. Mar 2017 - Mar 2018 5. Mar 2018 - Mar 2019 6. Mar 2019 - Mar 2020 7. Mar 2020 - Mar 2021 It focuses on the seventh interval which is when COVID-19 deaths have occurred. It combines an analysis of mortality trends with details on COVID-19 deaths. This is a fairly simplistic analysis that looks to cross-check COVID-19 death statistics using data from other sources. The subject of what constitutes a death from COVID-19 is controversial. This analysis is not concerned with addressing this controversy. It is concerned with comparing mortality data from a number of sources to identify potential discrepancies. It may be the case that while the total apparent excess number of deaths over an interval is less than the published number of COVID-19 deaths, the consequence of COVID-19 is to accelerate deaths that might have occurred later in the measurement interval. Notes on RIP.ie Web Site Data This analysis uses data from RIP.ie for the interval 1 January 2014 to 31 March 2021. RIP.ie is a web site that contains death notices that are also published in newspapers. The information available on a death on RIP.ie includes: 1 I have used this same approach in two other Irish mortality analyses: Analysis of Irish Mortality Using Public Data Sources 2014-2020 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/349670237_Analysis_of_Irish_Mortality_Using_Public_Data_Sources_2014 -2020 DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.36536.06403 Analysis of Possible Excess COVID-19 Deaths in Ireland https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342866515_Analysis_of_Possible_Excess_COVID-19_Deaths_in_Ireland DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.23114.29121
- 5. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 5 • Name of deceased • Six-digit reference • Date the death notice was published • Date of death • County of the deceased • Town of the deceased (this is frequently blank) • Text of death notice The information must be scraped from the web pages containing death notices displayed by the site. This extracted information has then to be parsed to make it usable. The data is informal. RIP.ie is the only publicly available source of detailed current death data in Ireland. However, the information needs to be filtered to make it usable. This processing is not exact and so the exclusion of deaths that have occurred outside Ireland may be problematic. There information is not present in the RIP.ie data that would be useful such as age at death and sex. Sex could be inferred from the name of deceased and the use of pronouns in the text of the notice. This results in inevitable differences between the officially published data and that extracted from RIP.ie. The RIP.ie data has a number of advantages over the officially published data: it is available immediately and contains a much greater level of granularity. The following schematic illustrates the key differences between the CSO and RIP.ie datasets. Figure 1 – Differences Between CSO and RIP.ie Mortality Data The CSO data is taken from deaths registered in Ireland. This includes anyone who died in Ireland. The reporting of deaths is mandatory so the data can be assumed to be very accurate. A small number of deaths may occur that may not be registered but this is likely to be very small. The use of RIP.ie is not mandatory for deaths. The RIP.ie data has a number of issues including: • There are multiple occurrences of the same notice with slightly different values for County and Town. • There are duplicate notices for the same death with different reference numbers.
- 6. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 6 • There are notices for deaths that occur in Northern Ireland. • There are notices for deaths of Irish people that occurred outside Ireland other than Northern Ireland. These notices can apply to deaths of Irish people who died while outside Ireland temporarily or Irish people who are resident outside Ireland long-term. • Death notices may not be published for foreign nationals who have died in Ireland, including both visitors, tourists and temporary workers but whose deaths will appear in the CSO data. • Death notices are frequently not published for the deaths of very young children but whose deaths will appear in the CSO data. • Some deaths will not have a death notice, but these deaths will appear in the CSO data. • Deaths for which a notice is published in one year may have occurred in a prior year. In some cases, the gap can be several years. • There are data errors. For example, the date of death in some cases is after the date of publication of the death notice. In this analysis death notices were extracted up to the end of January 2021 to cater for this. There may be deaths that occurred in 2020 that were not published until after that date. • Some death notices have a date published value but no date of death value. In these cases, I have assumed that the date is death is the date of publication. • A small number of notices refer to more than one death. The following table summarises the results of the processing of the RIP.ie data that was performed to address these issues. Year RIP.ie Death Notices Published Calculated Individual Deaths Reduction 2014 34,564 28,351 6,213 2015 37,168 29,385 7,783 2016 39,473 30,499 8,974 2017 40,239 30,313 9,926 2018 42,003 31,158 10,845 2019 42,459 31,163 11,296 2020 44,074 32,090 11,984 Total 279,980 212,959 67,021 The following table summarises the differences between the RIP.ie and CSO VSQ04 time series2 for the numbers of deaths in the four quarters for the years 2014 and 2020 and overall for each year. At the time this analysis was generated (Feb 2021), the CSO data is only available up to 2020Q2. Year 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 Quarter 1 CSO 8,110 8,604 8,609 9,067 9,278 8,618 8,674 RIP.ie 7,854 8,249 8,462 8,436 9,227 8,257 8,459 Difference 256 355 147 631 51 361 215 Difference % 3.26% 4.30% 1.74% 7.48% 0.55% 4.37% 2.54% Quarter 2 CSO 7,197 7,565 7,697 7,315 7,592 7,519 8,582 RIP.ie 6,667 7,019 7,129 6,959 7,305 7,558 8,477 2 VSQ04 Total Births, Deaths and Marriages Registered https://data.cso.ie/table/VSQ04
- 7. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 7 Difference 530 546 568 356 287 -39 105 Difference % 7.95% 7.78% 7.97% 5.12% 3.93% -0.52% 1.24% Quarter 3 CSO 7,001 6,851 7,129 6,987 7,143 7,358 RIP.ie 6,581 6,689 6,921 6,877 6,976 6,959 7,060 Difference 420 162 208 110 167 399 Difference % 6.38% 2.42% 3.01% 1.60% 2.39% 5.73% Quarter 4 CSO 6,787 6,932 6,955 7,115 7,103 7,639 RIP.ie 7,249 7,428 7,987 8,041 7,650 8,389 8,094 Difference -462 -496 -1,032 -926 -547 -750 Difference % -6.37% -6.68% -12.92% -11.52% -7.15% -8.94% Annual CSO 29,095 29,952 30,390 30,484 31,116 31,134 RIP.ie 28,351 29,385 30,499 30,313 31,158 31,163 32,090 Difference 744 567 -109 171 -42 -29 Difference % 2.62% 1.93% -0.36% 0.56% -0.13% -0.09% Averages Average CSO Deaths Per Day 79.71 82.06 83.03 83.52 85.25 85.30 Average RIP.ie Deaths Per Day 77.67 80.51 83.33 83.05 85.36 85.38 87.92 2016 and 2020 were leap years so for each of these years, there will be an additional day’s deaths added to the first quarter and to the year total. The two sets of numbers are generally quite close. The implicit assumption here is that the CSO death statistics are completely accurate. Variations In Mortality Rates And Assessment Of COVID-19 Mortality The differences in the expected and actual number of deaths within the internal Mar 2020 to Mar 2021 will be due to many possible factors such as: • Reduced expected deaths due to lockdown-related factors and associated reduction of economic activities – road traffic and other travel-related, crime, public consumption of alcohol and workplace accidents. • Reduced deaths of foreign visitors to Ireland who would have died while in Ireland because of the absence of tourism and business travel. • Deaths caused by COVID-19 that would not have happened. • Deaths attributed to COVID-19, but which would have happened anyway within the measurement interval. • Excess deaths due to but not attributed to COVID-19. • Excess deaths due to factors such as failure to seek medical attention for serious illness, failure of emergency services to respond to call sufficiently quickly because of perceived or actual excess workload. • Diversion of medical resources leading to delays in treatments and lengthening waiting lists3. 3 Outpatient waiting list data for Ireland is available at https://data.ehealthireland.ie/group/ntpf. In the interval Jan 2019 to Dec 2020, the numbers on outpatient waiting lists who were wating for various intervals changed as follows:
- 8. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 8 • Excess deaths due to Irish people who would have died on holidays abroad but who now have died while remaining in Ireland. • Effective cessation of all migration – both immigration and emigration – and its consequent impact on the size and age profile of the Irish population and thus population mortality rates and numbers. • Changing rates of and differences in seasonal rates of suicide possibly due to COVID-19 lockdown-related factors such as reduced income, reduced exercise, increased anxiety. • Change in rates of seasonal influenza4 These are all sources of noise that makes any analysis complex and problematic. It is outside the scope of this analysis to address these factors. Simplistically, the model for excess deaths could be represented as follows: Figure 2 – Sample Model of Excess COVID-19 Deaths However, the reality is more complex. There is no standard definition of how a death is attributed to COVID-19. The attribution can be done inclusively – COVID-19 is assigned as a cause of death if it was present or a contributing factor – or exclusively – COVID-19 is assigned as a cause of death only if it directly caused the death and there was no reasonable chance of any underlying condition being a contributory factor. This more complex model can be represented as follows: 0-3 Months 3-6 Months 6-9 Months 9-12 Months 12-15 Months 15-18 Months 18+ Months -0.86% -14.18% -36.38% 18.46% 48.97% 39.95% 43.86% Reductions in the size of lower waiting list time bands indicates that fewer people are being admitted to waiting lists because they are not being seen and people not being treated are moving to longer duration time bands. Overall waiting list queue sizes have increased by 17.08%. 4 The 2020-2021 influenza season was characterised by low numbers of deaths – see https://www.hpsc.ie/a- z/respiratory/influenza/seasonalinfluenza/surveillance/influenzasurveillancereports/20202021season. Presumably one factor that caused this was reduced rates of personal interactions due to COVID-19 restrictions
- 9. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 9 Figure 3 – More Complex Model for Excess COVID-19 Deaths Any such analysis is hampered by the lack of detailed and current mortality statistics for Ireland. COVID-19 Mortality Data Irish COVID-19 data is available at https://covid-19.geohive.ie/. Detailed data is available from the dataset CovidStatisticsProfileHPSCIrelandOpenData available at https://covid- 19.geohive.ie/datasets/d8eb52d56273413b84b0187a4e9117be_0. This dataset contains the following columns: X Y Date ConfirmedCovidCases TotalConfirmedCovidCases ConfirmedCovidDeaths TotalCovidDeaths StatisticsProfileDate CovidCasesConfirmed HospitalisedCovidCases RequiringICUCovidCases HealthcareWorkersCovidCases ClustersNotified HospitalisedAged5 HospitalisedAged5to14 HospitalisedAged15to24 HospitalisedAged25to34 HospitalisedAged35to44 HospitalisedAged45to54 HospitalisedAged55to64 HospitalisedAged65up Male Female Unknown Aged1to4 Aged5to14 Aged15to24 Aged25to34 Aged35to44
- 10. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 10 Aged45to54 Aged55to64 Aged65up Median_Age CommunityTransmission CloseContact TravelAbroad FID HospitalisedAged65to74 HospitalisedAged75to84 HospitalisedAged85up Aged65to74 Aged75to84 Aged85up The column ConfirmedCovidDeaths contains the number of daily deaths. The column TotalCovidDeaths contains the cumulative number of deaths. However, there are discrepancies between these two counters. The following extract illustrates this. The column Cumulative Deaths from Daily Totals is the sum of the column ConfirmedCovidDeaths that contains the number of daily deaths. The column Individual Daily Deaths From Cumulative is the daily total derived from the column TotalCovidDeaths that contains the cumulative number of deaths. Date ConfirmedCovid Deaths TotalCovidDeat hs Cumulative Deaths from Daily Totals Individual Daily Deaths From Cumulative Difference Wed 01 Apr 2020 14 85 85 14 0 Thu 02 Apr 2020 13 99 98 14 -1 Fri 03 Apr 2020 22 120 120 21 1 Sat 04 Apr 2020 17 137 137 17 0 Sun 05 Apr 2020 21 158 158 21 0 Mon 06 Apr 2020 16 174 174 16 0 Tue 07 Apr 2020 36 210 210 36 0 Wed 08 Apr 2020 25 235 235 25 0 Thu 09 Apr 2020 28 263 263 28 0 Fri 10 Apr 2020 25 287 288 24 1 Sat 11 Apr 2020 33 320 321 33 0 Sun 12 Apr 2020 14 334 335 14 0 Mon 13 Apr 2020 31 365 366 31 0 Tue 14 Apr 2020 41 406 407 41 0 Wed 15 Apr 2020 38 444 445 38 0 Thu 16 Apr 2020 43 486 488 42 1 Fri 17 Apr 2020 44 530 532 44 0 Sat 18 Apr 2020 41 571 573 41 0 Sun 19 Apr 2020 39 610 612 39 0 Mon 20 Apr 2020 77 687 689 77 0 Tue 21 Apr 2020 44 730 733 43 1 Wed 22 Apr 2020 49 769 782 39 10 Thu 23 Apr 2020 28 794 810 25 3 Fri 24 Apr 2020 37 829 847 35 2 Sat 25 Apr 2020 42 868 889 39 3
- 11. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 11 Date ConfirmedCovid Deaths TotalCovidDeat hs Cumulative Deaths from Daily Totals Individual Daily Deaths From Cumulative Difference Sun 26 Apr 2020 26 1,087 915 219 -193 Mon 27 Apr 2020 18 1,102 933 15 3 Tue 28 Apr 2020 45 1,159 978 57 -12 Wed 29 Apr 2020 31 1,190 1,009 31 0 Thu 30 Apr 2020 43 1,232 1,052 42 1 Fri 01 May 2020 34 1,265 1,086 33 1 Sat 02 May 2020 25 1,286 1,111 21 4 Sun 03 May 2020 19 1,303 1,130 17 2 Mon 04 May 2020 16 1,319 1,146 16 0 Tue 05 May 2020 23 1,339 1,169 20 3 Wed 06 May 2020 37 1,375 1,206 36 1 Thu 07 May 2020 29 1,403 1,235 28 1 Fri 08 May 2020 27 1,429 1,262 26 1 Sat 09 May 2020 18 1,446 1,280 17 1 Sun 10 May 2020 12 1,458 1,292 12 0 Mon 11 May 2020 15 1,467 1,307 9 6 For example, from Sat 25 Apr 2020 to Sun 26 Apr 2020 the value of TotalCovidDeaths goes from 868 to 1,087, an increase of 219. The cumulative number of deaths from the column ConfirmedCovidDeaths is 915, The difference between TotalCovidDeaths and calculated cumulative number of deaths is 193. The following chart shows the values of ConfirmedCovidDeaths from the published dataset and daily number of deaths from the column TotalCovidDeaths calculated by subtracting the value of a day from that of a previous day. Figure 4 – Daily Number Of Deaths From The Column TotalCovidDeaths And The Daily Deaths From The Column ConfirmedCovidDeaths
- 12. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 12 Figure 5 – Daily Number Of Deaths From The Column TotalCovidDeaths, The Daily Deaths From The Column ConfirmedCovidDeaths And Their Difference The following chart shows the values of TotalCovidDeaths from the published dataset and cumulative number of deaths from the column ConfirmedCovidDeaths. Figure 6 –TotalCovidDeaths And Cumulative Deaths From The Column ConfirmedCovidDeaths
- 13. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 13 Over the interval Tue 03 Mar 2020, when the first death from COVID-19 was recorded, to Wed 21 Apr 2021, these two series nearly converge. The value of TotalCovidDeaths 4,856 while the sum of ConfirmedCovidDeaths is 4,852. The remainder of this analysis uses the daily values from the column ConfirmedCovidDeaths. Mortality Analysis This analysis looks at the number of deaths extracted from the RIP.ie website from 1 January 2014 to 31 March 2021. It compares number of deaths for the seven 13-month intervals: Mar 2014 - Mar 2015 Mar 2015 - Mar 2016 Mar 2016 - Mar 2017 Mar 2017 - Mar 2018 Mar 2018 - Mar 2019 Mar 2019 - Mar 2020 Mar 2020 - Mar 2021 A minor complication is any analysis is that the years 2016 and 2020 are leap years and so contain an extra day of deaths. The following table summarises the numbers of deaths taken from RIP.ie for these seven intervals. Interval Deaths Feb-29 Deaths Mar 2014 - Mar 2015 31,283 Mar 2015 - Mar 2016 32,348 90 Mar 2016 - Mar 2017 33,254 Mar 2017 - Mar 2018 33,671 Mar 2018 - Mar 2019 33,103 Mar 2019 - Mar 2020 34,048 70 Mar 2020 - Mar 2021 36,412 The difference between the deaths for the intervals Mar 2019 - Mar 2020 and Mar 2020 - Mar 2021 is 2,364. This is quite a bit less than number of COVID-19 deaths of 4,687 (TotalCovidDeaths) or 4,670 (sum of ConfirmedCovidDeaths). The following chart shows the daily numbers of deaths for these seven 13-month intervals. The values for the interval Mar 2020 - Mar 2021 are highlighted.
- 14. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 14 Figure 7 – Daily Deaths For The Seven 13-Month Intervals from Mar 2014 To Mar 20201 From RIP.ie The chart shows a definite increase in the number of deaths recorded on the RIP.ie website for two intervals 25 Mar 2020 to 16 May 2020 and from 10 Jan 2021 and 19 Feb 2021. The following chart shows the average daily deaths over the six 13-month intervals from Mar 2014 to Mar 2020 and the deaths for the seventh interval from Mar 2020 to Mar 2021. Figure 8 – Average Daily Deaths For Intervals From 2014 To 2020 And Deaths From Mar 2020 To March 2021 From RIP.ie
- 15. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 15 Again, this shows very clearly the definite increase in the number of deaths recorded on the RIP.ie website for two intervals 25 Mar to 16 May 2020 and from 10 Jan 2021 and 19 Feb 2021. The following chart shows the range of daily deaths for the six 13-month intervals from Mar 2014 to Mar 2020 and the deaths for the seventh interval from Mar 2020 to Mar 2021. Figure 9 – Range of Daily Deaths For Intervals From 2014 To 2020 And Deaths From Mar 2020 To March 2021 From RIP.ie The illustrates the variations in the numbers of daily deaths that occur naturally and that make assessment of any increased deaths more difficult. Again, it shows that the numbers of deaths from Mar 2020 to Mar 2021 are generally within the bounds of deaths in previous years except for the two intervals 25 Mar to 16 May 2020 and from 10 Jan 2021 and 19 Feb 2021. The following chart shows the number of daily deaths from Mar 2020 to Mar 2021 together with the sum of the average number of deaths from the intervals from Mar 2014 to Mar 2020 and the number of COVID-19 deaths.
- 16. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 16 Figure 10 – Daily Deaths From Mar 2020 To March 2021 And The Sum Of The Average Daily Deaths From 2020 To 2021 From RIP.ie And COVID-19 Deaths This shows that the daily sum of average deaths for the six intervals from 2014 to 2014 are added to COVID-19 exceeds the daily number of deaths in the interval 13 Jan 2021 to 10 Mar 2021 as illustrated in the highlighted area. The following chart shows the range of daily deaths for the six intervals from Mar 2014 to Mar 2020 together with the sum of the average number of deaths from the intervals from Mar 2014 to Mar 2020 and the number of COVID- 19 deaths.
- 17. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 17 Figure 11 – Range Of Daily Deaths From Mar 2014 To Mar 2020 And The Sum Of The Average Daily Deaths From 2020 To 2021 From RIP.ie And COVID-19 Deaths This shows that the daily sum of average deaths for the six intervals from 2014 to 2014 are added to COVID-19 exceeds the daily number of deaths for the two intervals: 7 Apr 2020 to 6 May 2020 13 Jan 2021 to 10 Mar 2021 as illustrated in the highlighted areas. The following chart shows the ranges of daily deaths for the two intervals: Mar 2014 to Mar 2020 Mar 2014 to Mar 2021 Figure 12 – Ranges Of Daily Deaths For Mar 2014 To Mar 2020 and Mar 2014 To Mar 2021 This shows the intervals where additional deaths occurred due to COVID-19. The following chart shows the ranges of daily deaths for the two intervals: Mar 2014 to Mar 2020 Mar 2014 to Mar 2021 together with the sum of the average number of deaths from the intervals from Mar 2014 to Mar 2020 and the number of COVID-19 deaths.
- 18. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 18 Figure 13 – Ranges Of Daily Deaths For Mar 2014 To Mar 2020 and Mar 2014 To Mar 2021 And The Sum Of The Average Daily Deaths From 2020 To 2021 From RIP.ie And COVID-19 Deaths This shows that the daily sum of average deaths for the six intervals from 2014 to 2014 are added to COVID-19 exceeds the daily number of deaths for the interval 13 Jan 2021 to 10 Mar 2021. The previous interval 7 Apr 2020 to 6 May 2020 is no longer a significant outlier. The following chart shows the ranges of daily deaths for the seven intervals from Mar 2014 to Mar 2021 together with the sum of the average number of deaths from the intervals from Mar 2014 to Mar 2020 and the number of COVID-19 deaths.
- 19. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 19 Figure 14 – Ranges Of Daily Deaths For Mar 2014 To Mar 2021 And The Sum Of The Average Daily Deaths From 2020 To 2021 From RIP.ie And COVID-19 Deaths This tends to indicate that the published numbers of COVID-19 deaths for the interval 13 Jan 2021 to 10 Mar 2021 are overstated. The following table shows more detailed mortality information for this interval. Date RIO.ie Daily Deaths Mar 2020 - Mar 2021 Average 2014- 2020 Average 2014- 2021 COVID-19 Deaths Average 2014- 2020 + COVID- 19 Deaths Difference Between RIP.ie Deaths And Average 2014- 2020 + COVID- 19 Deaths 10/01/2021 147 109.0 114.4 8 117.0 -30.0 11/01/2021 141 100.0 105.9 8 108.0 -33.0 12/01/2021 147 104.2 110.3 46 150.2 3.2 13/01/2021 140 109.2 113.6 63 172.2 32.2 14/01/2021 131 103.5 107.4 28 131.5 0.5 15/01/2021 142 97.0 103.4 50 147.0 5.0 16/01/2021 144 107.5 112.7 60 167.5 23.5 17/01/2021 118 91.7 95.4 13 104.7 -13.3 18/01/2021 144 96.5 103.3 8 104.5 -39.5 19/01/2021 135 99.2 104.3 93 192.2 57.2 20/01/2021 162 93.8 103.6 61 154.8 -7.2 21/01/2021 153 105.5 112.3 51 156.5 3.5 22/01/2021 150 94.7 102.6 52 146.7 -3.3 23/01/2021 116 102.7 104.6 77 179.7 63.7 24/01/2021 100 98.2 98.4 23 121.2 21.2 25/01/2021 119 89.5 93.7 7 96.5 -22.5 26/01/2021 166 95.0 105.1 90 185.0 19.0 27/01/2021 157 100.7 108.7 54 154.7 -2.3
- 20. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 20 Date RIO.ie Daily Deaths Mar 2020 - Mar 2021 Average 2014- 2020 Average 2014- 2021 COVID-19 Deaths Average 2014- 2020 + COVID- 19 Deaths Difference Between RIP.ie Deaths And Average 2014- 2020 + COVID- 19 Deaths 28/01/2021 160 94.3 103.7 47 141.3 -18.7 29/01/2021 115 100.2 102.3 48 148.2 33.2 30/01/2021 118 104.8 106.7 79 183.8 65.8 31/01/2021 131 101.8 106.0 15 116.8 -14.2 01/02/2021 170 99.2 109.3 10 109.2 -60.8 02/02/2021 126 91.8 96.7 101 192.8 66.8 03/02/2021 136 87.2 94.1 94 181.2 45.2 04/02/2021 124 95.7 99.7 75 170.7 46.7 05/02/2021 121 97.2 100.6 35 132.2 11.2 06/02/2021 114 92.5 95.6 55 147.5 33.5 07/02/2021 110 96.3 98.3 12 108.3 -1.7 08/02/2021 130 97.7 102.3 6 103.7 -26.3 09/02/2021 129 95.3 100.1 68 163.3 34.3 10/02/2021 119 89.2 93.4 54 143.2 24.2 11/02/2021 125 98.3 102.1 52 150.3 25.3 12/02/2021 117 95.3 98.4 23 118.3 1.3 13/02/2021 118 93.5 97.0 66 159.5 41.5 14/02/2021 105 101.2 101.7 17 118.2 13.2 15/02/2021 123 98.8 102.3 0 98.8 -24.2 16/02/2021 105 93.5 95.1 33 126.5 21.5 17/02/2021 128 97.5 101.9 57 154.5 26.5 18/02/2021 103 90.2 92.0 47 137.2 34.2 19/02/2021 116 95.2 98.1 28 123.2 7.2 20/02/2021 92 88.2 88.7 26 114.2 22.2 21/02/2021 95 89.2 90.0 1 90.2 -4.8 22/02/2021 92 91.0 91.1 1 92.0 0.0 23/02/2021 92 86.2 87.0 45 131.2 39.2 24/02/2021 95 88.8 89.7 56 144.8 49.8 25/02/2021 82 84.8 84.4 35 119.8 37.8 26/02/2021 102 90.2 91.9 29 119.2 17.2 27/02/2021 104 95.0 96.3 13 108.0 4.0 28/02/2021 104 92.0 93.7 6 98.0 -6.0 01/03/2021 91 89.0 89.3 1 90.0 -1.0 02/03/2021 99 94.7 95.3 14 108.7 9.7 03/03/2021 85 95.7 94.1 25 120.7 35.7 04/03/2021 100 91.0 92.3 39 130.0 30.0 05/03/2021 86 90.0 89.4 9 99.0 13.0 06/03/2021 95 94.8 94.9 14 108.8 13.8 07/03/2021 77 89.8 88.0 3 92.8 15.8 08/03/2021 85 95.5 94.0 0 95.5 10.5 09/03/2021 102 90.3 92.0 30 120.3 18.3 10/03/2021 80 93.0 91.1 47 140.0 60.0 Total 7,113 5,734 5,931 2,208 7,942 829 The RIP.ie website records 7,113 for the interval 13 Jan 2021 to 10 Mar 2021. The number of published COVID-19 deaths in this interval is 2,208. The sum of the average deaths for the six intervals from Mar 2024 to Mar 2020 is
- 21. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 21 5,734. The sum of this average and the published COVID-19 deaths is 7,942. This is 829 greater than the 7,113 deaths recorded on the RIP.ie website. Another observation that can be seen from the data in this table is that the individual daily differences between the RIP.ie deaths and the sum of the average daily deaths from 2014-2020 and the COVID-19 deaths are negative for 17 of the 60 days. This may be caused by variations when COVID-19 deaths are recorded. Conclusions Accurate data is needed to make informed decisions. Clearly there are issues with Irish COVID-19 mortality data. It is unfortunate that mortality data has to be extracted from informal public sources due to substantial gaps in officially published data. Accurate data is also needed to ensure public confidence in decision-making. Where this published data is inaccurate, this can lead of a loss of this confidence that can exploited.
- 22. Comparison of COVID-19 Mortality Data and Deaths for Ireland March 2020 – March 2021 Using Public Data Sources Page 22 For more information, please contact: http://ie.linkedin.com/in/alanmcsweeney