
Coronavirus: Care home deaths 'far higher' than official figures - DanBC
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-52341403
======
smoyer
In the U.S., it's pretty broadly assumed that in hot-spots like NYC, the death
rate is also being under-counted. Apparently, those who die in their
apartments are not added to the official death-toll. Another method for
finding these excess deaths is to compare January or February to the rate in
the same month of 2019 and then extrapolate the expected death rate for April
2020. This number will obviously be lower than the actual death rate so the
difference should be considered COVID-19 related. Note that even this is
probably low since other factors like deaths from car accidents (which I would
expect to be down this year) aren't considered. Since we're burying many of
the dead without testing, I think the best numbers we're going to get will
come from statisticians/actuaries.

~~~
panpanna
The only country that is counting deads at people's homes and care facilities
is Sweden and they have significantly higher fatality numbers than anyone
else.

They also just started looking at increase in general deaths to see if any are
related to corona. I think there will be a jump in the numbers soon.

(Since this will probably come up: Despite popular belief, Sweden _is_ under
partial lockdown)

~~~
allannienhuis
We're counting covid deaths in care facilities (old-folks homes) in Canada.
We're finding it (tragically) one of the largest categories.

But I'm sure you'll find it true in any country that those deaths are under
reported to some extent due to some lack of testing before the first clinical
diagnosis of covid in a facility earlier on in the pandemic.

Tracking this stuff is really messy, when testing just isn't available
universally, and current tests are only a point-in-time confirmation. We won't
have much more accurate statistics until there's a test that can tell if you
were infected at some point (forget the name for that type of test).

~~~
goalieca
> We're finding it (tragically) one of the largest categories

Our prime minister said it accounted for over half of the deaths.

------
chongli
Does anyone else feel like this has been a long time coming for seniors’ care
homes and retirement centres? For years, I have heard many outrageous stories
of elderly abuse and neglect at these types of places. I’m sure some of them
aren’t terrible, but I’ve always felt they were essentially warehousing
elderly people so that their families didn’t have to look after them.

All of this is of course because their offspring, the present working-age
demographic, are busier than ever at work. It used to be (and perhaps still is
in some countries) that people would live in multigenerational homes.
Grandparents would participate in the rearing of their grandchildren and in
turn receive care and support from their offspring. Houses were never empty
during the day, as they so often are in the suburbs we occupy these days.
Perhaps it’s time we reconsider our ideas around the nuclear family and
revisit the traditional way of life.

~~~
ReactiveJelly
> this is of course because their offspring, the present working-age
> demographic, are busier than ever at work.

Even if I was retired, I wouldn't want to spend several hours of my day
nursing someone. I'm not good at that, and I don't enjoy it.

> people would live in multigenerational homes

I would much sooner live in a small apartment with my wife than have either of
my parents in my house. They aren't my friends, I don't enjoy their company, I
would be constantly avoiding topics that my wife and I talk about freely like
politics or sexuality.

One of my parents doesn't know that I'm transgender and the other one isn't
thrilled about it. I would expect a lot of negativity about that.

> I’ve always felt they were essentially warehousing elderly people so that
> their families didn’t have to look after them.

Maybe they're a local maximum.

We've realized that taking care of seniors, especially when they live longer
than ever in gradually worsening health, doesn't sound like a good use of our
time.

But euthanizing them is obviously off the table. [1] So the nursing home
evolved as a way to 'politely' live as though your parents or grandparents
have already died.

Nobody really likes it, but the alternatives are worse.

[1] It might have been acceptable in a small farming village in the old days
where the alternative was everyone starving.

But it's hard to justify when the only thing I might lose from a
multigenerational lifestyle is my own happiness, my free time, my freedom, a
lot of money, and my marriage. If I only stand to lose everything _but_ my
life, it sounds selfish to say I want them to live somewhere else.

~~~
ta1771
Not trying to start a flamewar, but if you werr to ask the other cultures
around the world that don't send their elders into the care of strangers...

the decision to stay present in the lives of their parents etc has nothing to
do with what they're good at (can be learned), or enjoy.

------
DanBC
I'm submitting this because there are people on HN who think we're over-
counting deaths to Covid-19.

This article shows that in some countries we're under-counting covid-19 deaths
by thousands.

In the UK we have two counts. There's the daily count from PHE. That's the
number used for sources like Worldometers. It only counts people who died in
hospital who were tested positive for covid-19.
[https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/](https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/)

We also have the ONS numbers. These are based on death certification and then
coding by statisticians. There's some lag involved. Here's the most recent
version, issued on 3rd April.
[https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsde...](https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/deathsregisteredweeklyinenglandandwalesprovisional/weekending3april2020)

~~~
mytailorisrich
I have never heard anyone claiming that deaths from covid-19 are over-counted.

It is clear that, if anything, they are indeed under-counted.

Edit: this is getting ridiculous being downvoted for reasonable comments. Is
this HN? No serious source claims that deaths are over-counted. Ignore fake
news from conspirationists. The US seem to be sinking if that what is
happening on your side of the pond.

~~~
DanBC
In this thread we have at least one person saying deaths are over-counted, and
there are plenty of similar comments on HN.

I agree about the down voting.

~~~
mytailorisrich
This is noise. Ignore it, don't amplify it.

