COVID-19 and other deaths
How to interpret
The following data is compared on this site:- Deaths (all causes) - blue line
- Official deaths Covid-19 - orange line
- Average deaths 2015-2019 - green line
- Week with the highest death number (usually record week from the past 5 years) - red line.
- The year 2015 (in most countries the year with the highest mortality in the past years) - light blue line
- Average deaths 2015-2019 and official deaths Covid-19 - to recognize pattern of possible underreporting - yellow dotted line
Usually, the death excess is calculated with the expected deaths in a time period as base. To simplify, the average of the past years is taken as a comparison. This does not into acount the seasonal fluctuation, but it's easier to compare between countries.
The other line with the record week is to set the current numbers into relation. To say it simply: when the 2020 numbers are way off the record or over a longer time, then there was a serious problem.
Last but not least, there is more to look at in this pandemic as just the deaths. Also those who survived had to be saved by people working hard over long periods. And not everybody who comes out of this alive is healthy like nothing happened.
Please note: the most recent two or three weeks are in many countries incomplete!
Source: Eurostat, except Switzerland: BfSCurrently no updates for Israel and UK.