29 January 2022

Worldometer

Throughout this ghastly pandemic, I have been following associated statistics with the aid of a respected reference  website called "Worldometer". Figures are updated every day.

Digesting the numbers, I have often wondered how different countries gather their data. Even in developed western democracies there is no internationally agreed common method  so that some countries may be over zealous in their calculations while others are rather lax.

Great Britain and Northern Ireland have the worst COVID death count in Europe  - 155,317 dead as I write but this small country has a very large population at just under 68.5 million so a simple death tally doesn't give the full picture. 

To get that I think you need to look at deaths per million. Britain's current figure is 2,269 deaths per million. However, there are eighteen other European countries with worse figures and the worst of all is Bulgaria with 4,819 deaths per million - more than double Britain's rate. Other countries with worse figures than Britain include Italy, Hungary, Czechia, Belgium, Poland and Ukraine.

Visitors from the United States might like to note that their death rate is currently 2,709 citizens per million with no less than eighteen states having a death rate of over 3,000 per million. The worst of all is Mississippi with 3,639 deaths per million. Canada's current death rate is 876 per million while Australia's is 136 per million and Germany's is 1,404 per million.

I have no reason to doubt Worldometer's statistics with regard to COVID but it would be interesting to discover how they gather the numbers and how different countries do their additions.

On a separate note...

Given the fact that Britain recorded 90,000 new cases yesterday as well as 277 COVID deaths, I remain perplexed as to why our government have just cancelled most restrictions. Is this connected with Johnson's popularity crisis and the tangle he finds himself in? I also wonder where Professor Chris Whitty has gone and where is Professor Patrick Vallance?  In their roles as Chief Medical Officer and Chief Scientist they appeared on television many times during the pandemic - carefully explaining things with honesty and integrity. It would be good to hear what they think now about the dropping of restrictions. In effect, have Johnson and his gang  ceased following "The Science"?

29 comments:

  1. I grieve to say that the U.S. state that is second to Mississippi in deaths per million is my own state of Arizona. In my county, which is represented in the U.S. Congress by the reprehensible Paul Gosar, the vaccination rate for all citizens has hung at 45% for many, many months. I grieve at the ignorance around me.

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    1. I didn't know about Arizona's low vaccine take up figures. I think that the technical term for this is "wallowing in ignorance".

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  2. The pandemic has uncovered all kinds of discrepancies around the world.

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    1. We should be together - all singing from the same hymn sheet.

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  3. It does sound suspicious that the medical people have disappeared. They've been "Fauci" ed, like our former president did when he had to face things he didn't want to. The statistics sound about right. Eastern Europe is struggling with vaccine acceptance from what I've read.

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    1. Yes. I remember when Dr Fauci was sidelined by The Great Ignoramus. After all, who wants truth?

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  4. So nice to know my country has the lowest death rate per million. Even happier to know that none of my family is among the dead.

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    1. From this viewpoint it looks as though the Australian government acted wisely to severely limit the COVID threat.

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  5. It is unfathomable that the UK has dropped most restrictions, but method in their madness no doubt. They all want to party and swan off to someone's villa in the Caribbean, or wherever, and now the truth is out about past indiscretions, they don't want to be held accountable in future

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    1. Dropping the restrictions at this juncture seems to be all about saving Johnson's bacon. It is disgusting that there should be any connection.

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  6. At the beginning of the pandemic, I read a lot about how data was gathered and transmitted here in Germany, There was (and to my knowledge still is) no one method used by all. Also, the criteria for what counts as death by the virus were unclear and not applied consistently. When was it death by, and when death with covid? All this aside, I still believe those numbers are, if maybe not exact, a good and reliable indicator for the overall situation.

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    1. Well you are a data professional so I knew you wouldn't accept the figures at face value. Digging below the surface is vital if you want the truth.

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    2. Meike, a data professional?

      I thought Meike was a retired agent with the Foreign Intelligence Service, the Bundesnachrichtendienst: try saying that after 2 or 12 glasses of schnapps.

      Working as a Black Forest Guide may only be Meike's cover.
      As Markus Wolf used to say, 'I was just doing my job.'

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    3. Retired, me?! I wish!

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    4. Spooks never retire, Meike.
      They take to walking in the towns around the Black Forest.
      Or else they go boating.

      *The Man Nobody Knew: In Search of My Father, CIA Spymaster William Colby.*
      YouTube.
      In the early 1990s my bookshop did a book search for Colby's autobiography,
      *Honorable Men* : the copy I purchased came from the USA.

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  7. There is a simple reason for what's happening, Johnson doesn't give a shit. Here we would say he doesn't give a flying fuck. As long as it's not him dying, he doesn't care.

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  8. I was surprised to find that I no longer need to have a covid test once I'm there. I don't even need one to fly. Will I have one? Yes. Because things change so rapidly that I'm afraid that I'd get to the airport to discover things had changed yet again, and that I wouldn't be able to fly without it. I honestly won't believe I'm on my way to my daughter until I am in the air.

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    1. I still feel apprehensive about flying and wonder when I will next fasten my seat-belt as instructed.

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  9. I, too, wonder what the statistics are based on. I don't think that here in US they are valid. It feels like they've just given up.

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    1. I suspect that American statistics are more trustworthy than those that emerge from certain other countries - including China!

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  10. Yes cases are high, but the rationale for removing restrictions is that, because of vaccination, covid is no longer as serious as it was. This does not of course help those who are unable to be vaccinated, or those who are ill, elderly or otherwise vulnerable. But I suppose that, accepted it is less serious for the vaccinated, then the relevant comparison figures are numbers in hospital and numbers of deaths. I don't have these figures but my impression is that they remain alarming high.

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    1. Are you one of Johnson's special advisers? I guess you are fond of parties. Why is Britain not in line with other countries with regard to restrictions designed to dampen COVID?

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  11. I take any statistic with a grain of salt, whether Covid numbers, crime numbers, economic figures, or whatever.

    Understand the criteria used and consider the source when examining statistics. That's my policy.

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  12. In my county, 1 out of every 5 people has had covid. Extrapolated, it would equal 200,000/million. If you wish to double check those figures, I am Warren County in Pennsylvania. Our last census showed us at 39,191 people. To be honest, I do believe that figure to be lower since that 2019 census (we've had an exodus of jobs), but it is the only figure that I have to go on. Our current fully vaccinated stands at 43.93, with 51.65 having received one dose.

    Interesting side note? When I typed in yorkshire pudding blogspot, I was directed to a Swedish girl's blog. Multiple times.

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  13. Typing "yorkshire pudding blogspot" here in England does not have the same result. Deaths per million is very different from cases per million.

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  14. Anonymous9:59 am

    Similar had happened hear with rare appearances now by those who we once saw daily. Our statistics were reliable, from reported PCR reported results. Now, much testing is done at home with RAT kits and it up to those who return a positive result to self report to a government website. I'm sure you can see how this could go wrong.

    While it like the rear end of a traffic jam, so many people here now are dying.

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  15. I don't know how many deaths per million we have had here in Australia but I think it will not be many although our Premier has today reported we had 13 deaths overnight here in Queensland. We are in the grip of a Omercron surge here as we have opened up our state borders with thousands of cases though the majority of them are fairly mild luckily and most of us are protected by 2 vaccinations plus boosters. We have been told that opening up had to happen and at least they waited till we were 85% vaccinated but after doing so well so early on it is not great living with it racing through the community.
    Damn China, I blame them completely !!

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  16. I always wonder about the rest of the world. The New York Times runs maps that show global COVID rates and deaths, and Asia and Africa are often shown with limited cases. But surely they're just not detecting them. Maybe they aren't testing as many people. Those of us in countries with comprehensive health care and testing capabilities are bound to record more cases, it seems to me.

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