Reflection on the pandemic: questions about the authorities' response.

The article says...

The main factor is that we are going through a demographic shift. Nothing in my followup post in contrary to that position - I was explaining how an increase in older people can lead to deaths over and above the population increase. A feedback loop.

I posted link earlier showing how in 1 UK region there were increased deaths due to ambulance delays. Now factor in A&E delays. Nationwide.

You say nothing new - as if you have closely followed these matters for the last decades. There have been excess mortality spikes in the past, nothing to do with lockdowns.

This is why you won't be happy with a tribunal.

It won't give you the only answer you will accept.

Here's that renowned right wing conspiracy theory paper The Guardian highlighting excess deaths from cardiac arrests and the impact that the pandemic has caused on all heart care services in Britain.

Maybe because people don't work 24/7.

No idea why you think it would be bad. I said it would be pointless based on previous tribunals.

In addition, I’d like the procurement processes to be made transparent and public, and an investigation into whether any of our politicians or NPHET members profited.

Other countries have uncovered such despicable behaviours and there’s no doubt in my mind there are chancers out there that got fat off the backs of dodgy dealings (in the middle of a pandemic!).

Also I’d quite like to see ISAG reined in more. Anthony Staines should not be let near a media outlet - but they seem to be gearing up for a full onslaught advocating more restrictions for this winter.

There have been suggestions that the excess deaths are caused by things such as heatwave, ageing population etc. These were attempts to explain this phenomenon at the national level i.e. in UK or Australia, at least from what I saw. The phenomenon of excess deaths however affects many countries and is quite prevalent in Europe. For clarity we are talking about non-covid excess deaths.

It is a very complex issue that needs to be considered from various angles. We could attempt to understand by framing the problem differently and instead of asking ‘What causes it?’, ask ‘What does not cause it?’. It is a simple rule of inversion and exclusion.

We could test the first hypothesis of heatwave. Sure enough countries such as Spain or Greece may have been affected by it and a substantial number of the excess deaths could be possibly attributed to it in the period when heatwaves occurred in those countries. However, if we look at the Nordic countries who while not exposed to the heatwave as much as the southern countries, still have had substantial excess deaths this year. With an exception of Sweden that is. Has Sweden avoided the heatwave while Finland and Norway haven’t? More locally, can we justify the fact that 24,400 excess deaths (cardiovascular causes mostly) have been reported in UK since May this year while the official number of days attributed to heatwave was something like a total of 13 - June (3), July (3) and August (7)? Can heatwave cause deaths in weeks before, during and after it occurs? Can 13 days of excessive temperature cause a total of 6 months of excess deaths? I'm sure we all can use a common sense to answer those.

The ageing population hypothesis. The unexplained excess death started to occur rather suddenly. Depending on a country in Europe they kicked in in Feb, March or April. One would have thought that ageing population is a slow and steady process that does not happen ‘over night’. It typically takes a decade or so to see any meaningful change. It has never before changed in a step-like way. More importantly however the excess death phenomenon is not confined to elderly only, it affects all demographics with ‘spikes’ occurring even in the newborn cohort (https://www.scotsman.com/health/scottish-government-orders-review-as-neonatal-deaths-higher-than-expected-3863538).

While both hypothesis are somewhat reasonable and could be applicable to some of the countries with some additional caveats/assumptions, I cannot see how they could have caused such a substantial excess in unexplained deaths across many countries.

The problem is that while immediate cause of excess death is relatively easy to establish, the contributory causes are not.

It's been frequently commented in the articles none of these in themselves happen overnight. But where say emergency response (Golden Hour) from an ambulance is required shortage of resources is having a significant impact. People are not going to A&E due to crisis of resources there. People aren't going to GP's for checkup and early intervention because of the resource crisis there. Obvious all other associated appointments, with consultants etc are delayed.

Is there trustworthy information about the rate of excess death in Sweden?

Thank you, it's hard to find trustworthy data, everyone will have bias worked in to the numbers.

I vividly remember how Sweden were portrayed in the media at the time...I remember some posters were encouraging people to wait a few years before they rushed to judgement, they weren't listened to...

Gov Ron deSantis in Florida is one who caught my attention too, he was the first Gov, of a major state (Florida is the 3rd most populous state) to drop all restrictions in Sept 2020, I remember how viciously the media went after him (that is a strong indicator he was doing the right thing), round the clock negative stories...now, I wouldn't particularly trust his data either, but he is going to the polls next week, he will be judged on his policies particularly his Covid policies, we will get to see how one of the most populous States in the US, who lived a much different 2 years than we all did, think about their Governor.

I only looked "why" when others asked about France and the UK excess. Any article I read banged on at length about systemic problems with their health infrastructure, basically in crisis before the pandemic and being compounded by it. A lot of resources still being consumed by patients with COVID or other long term triggered by it. Bed blocking is a problem due to long term patients. They entered the pandemic already in crisis.

When I look up Sweden it enviably talks about best in the world health infrastructure with plenty of resources which deliver far higher bang for buck than do other countries. So they weren't in crisis before or after the pandemic. So better able to handle increased demand.

Until I read these reports on excess I didn't realize that new COVID cases are still causing resource issues in hospitals.

As for the media. I expect they find it hard to make click bait stories on something that's not easily understood. Also health service seems to be in permanently in crisis. Thread thread is mostly ignoring it. So maybe the media are right.

Did they see much much sun in Sweden I wonder, or a mild Oct even!!!