Death is occurring globally above and beyond what we would have expected to see

BY SIMONE J. SMITH

“12 people have died today…”

“24 people have died today…”

Death! Death! Death!

As of late, there is not a day that has gone by that I am not hearing about someone who has died. Now, death is one of the only aspects of life that we are sure of, and yes, at least one person dies every day, but according to the head of Indianapolis-based insurance company OneAmerica, the death rate is up a stunning 40% from pre-pandemic levels among working-age people.

“We are seeing, right now, the highest death rates we have seen in the history of this business – not just at OneAmerica,” the company’s CEO Scott Davison said during an online news conference last week. “Just to give you an idea of how bad that is, a three-sigma or a one-in-200-year catastrophe would be a 10% increase over pre-pandemic,” he said. “So, 40% is just unheard of.”

What we are currently experiencing is excess mortality, a term used in epidemiology and public health that refers to the number of deaths from all causes during a crisis above and beyond what we would have expected to see under normal conditions.

However, COVID deaths are not what is driving this astonishing rise. Deaths related to the virus are, in fact, down to half of what they were a year ago.

 “What the data is showing us is that the deaths that are being reported as COVID deaths greatly understate the actual death losses among working-age people from the pandemic. It may not all be COVID on their death certificate, but deaths are up just huge, huge numbers,” he said, adding that the company has seen an “uptick” in disability claims – at first short-term, and now long-term.

The impact that the pandemic has had on all aspects of individual health is noteworthy and deserves more attention.

Indeed, excess deaths started to appear about four months after the trajectory of COVID-19 vaccines and followed a similar parabolic ascent. There is also a strong correlation to the second dose.

In addition to people dying from the virus and vaccinations, diminished access to medical care and medication, as well as mental health services, contributed to the rise in non-Covid deaths. CDC preliminary data showed that drug overdose deaths topped 100,000 for the first time ever during the one-year period ending April 2021.

There has also been a slight rise in the number of women dying due to pregnancy or childbirth each year in the United States. What is disturbing is the fact that the maternal death rate among Black women is still three times the rate for White women according to a recent federal report.

The overall number of women identified as having died of maternal causes in the United States climbed from 658 in 2018 to 754 in 2019 and 861 in 2020, according to the new National Center for Health Statistics report, released Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“The rates for non-Hispanic Black women were significantly higher than rates for non-Hispanic White and Hispanic women,” Donna Hoyert of the CDC’s Division of Vital Statistics wrote in the new report.

There are some important points that readers have to keep in mind about the current excess mortality figures. The reported number of deaths might not count all deaths that have occurred. In this article, we were focused on deaths in North America, but what if we took a moment to take a look at what was happening around the globe?

First of all, not all countries have the infrastructure and capacity to register and report all deaths. In many low and middle-income countries, undercounting of mortality is a serious issue. The UN estimates that in normal times, before the pandemic, only two-thirds of countries register at least 90% of all deaths that occur, and some countries even register less than 50%.

Another aspect to consider is the fact that there are delays in death reporting that makes mortality data invalid. The extent of the delay varies from country to country.

It is sad to say that things are looking dismal for our world, and unfortunately, with the pending war that is brewing, and the fallout occurring due to the pandemic, it looks like things are going to only get worse.

I guess all we can do is keep an eye out for the headlines…