Excess Deaths and the Great Pandemic of 2020

Two new reports in JAMA provide updated estimates regarding the mortality associated with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic in the US. In a research letter by Woolf and colleagues, the authors update their analysis of the number of “excess” deaths in the US related to COVID-19 and other causes from March 1 through August 1, 2020. The authors report that during this 5-month period, a total of 1 336 561 deaths occurred in the US, an estimated 20% increase compared with the number of expected deaths, and representing 225  530 excess deaths. Approximately 67% of these excess deaths were attributable directly to COVID-19, whereas excess deaths attributed to other causes also could have been related to the pandemic in general.
Source: JAMA - Category: General Medicine Source Type: research