I've had people argue to me (1) the 2.8 million is to 12/5, so extrapolating it is about 10% higher number which is around 280k and (2) the death numbers are sometimes delayed additional weeks so updated later.
Just saying if you argue with somebody they may bring that up..
I point out that they try to line up the covid death #s to exactly match "excess deaths", without (1) adding the normal growth rates or (2) demographic changes (more older people from baby boomer gen), or (3) causes of death doesn't line up, (4) flu death number went to almost zero which seems weird.
My points made are usually (1) there may be an absolute number of death increase, even after the things mentioned above, but numbers are much lower than they say, (2) there are a lot of anomalies in the data so there needs to be auditing of the stats, (3) the death rate increase, even with an absolute increase is minimal, (4) life expectancy hasn't changed (within margin of error)
Another point is even if it's over 250k extra in absolute, that's basically the absolute yearly difference between 2013 and 2019. Nobody was hysterical about that.
So, as you said, overall conclusion is it may have gone up, but the amount and impact is being exaggerated.
Are you sure that extrapolated # is correct?
I've had people argue to me (1) the 2.8 million is to 12/5, so extrapolating it is about 10% higher number which is around 280k and (2) the death numbers are sometimes delayed additional weeks so updated later.
Just saying if you argue with somebody they may bring that up..
I point out that they try to line up the covid death #s to exactly match "excess deaths", without (1) adding the normal growth rates or (2) demographic changes (more older people from baby boomer gen), or (3) causes of death doesn't line up, (4) flu death number went to almost zero which seems weird.
My points made are usually (1) there may be an absolute number of death increase, even after the things mentioned above, but numbers are much lower than they say, (2) there are a lot of anomalies in the data so there needs to be auditing of the stats, (3) the death rate increase, even with an absolute increase is minimal, (4) life expectancy hasn't changed (within margin of error)
Another point is even if it's over 250k extra in absolute, that's basically the absolute yearly difference between 2013 and 2019. Nobody was hysterical about that.
So, as you said, overall conclusion is it may have gone up, but the amount and impact is being exaggerated.