Facts, not the narrative

March 10, 2021. Don't just tell me a story. Tell me the full story, with facts.

As a quick follow up to my last post, about three primary drivers of Covid deaths, I wanted to tie in my issues with not only problems with measuring and classifying Covid-caused (vis-a-vis 'associated') deaths as well as Covid 'cases' (vis-a-vis positive PCR tests or asymptomatic). My evidence to date shows that the 2020 US overall mortality rate is about 0.00939, as compared to the UN-forecasted rate of 0.009, not a large difference, even with a large (and growing and aging) US population.

This all leads to ask -- before I go ahead and see if I can look up the answers myself -- how have various other mortality rates been impacted this past year? Are murders up? How about the suicide rate? domestic abuse deaths? fentanyl deaths? On this last point, not long ago, data out of San Francisco showed fentanyl deaths to be three times the number of Covid deaths.

Okay, here is one mid-year 2020 accounting of the latest twelve months of drug overdose deaths. Looking at the 1999-2019 data (see initial chart), that means an increase in annual deaths from 20,000 in 1999 to 80,000 in twelve months, 2019-20. That is both a big twenty-year increase; it is also a significant 'spike' from what had been a relatively no-increase period in the four preceding years. It would not surprise me to see 100,000 deaths as the final count for 2020.

While I fear all the above-mentioned rates have increased, what rates have declined? Perhaps auto accident deaths, college student alcohol deaths, workplace murders?

So let's look at murders, a lot of murders. Statista.com has a lot of good data. And they report: "In late December the Associated Press reported that 2020 was on track to become the deadliest year in U.S. history with the total number of deaths forecast to rise 15 percent compared to 2019, primarily due to the coronavirus pandemic."

Then you have lame excuses by mayors, like Bill DiBlasio, who attribute the increase to the criminal justice system being "on pause," which is code for the police either being ordered to stand down or find risky to investigate crimes that can lead to charges of police brutality, murder or misconduct.

"New York's homicide count went up by nearly 40 percent with Mayor Bill de Blasio stating that the figures should worry all New Yorkers and it has to stop. He attributed the situation "in part, to the coronavirus and to the fact that people are cooped up", according to NPR, adding that "it's certainly related to the fact that the criminal justice system is on pause and that's causing a lot of problems".

Influenza deaths appear to have fallen off the proverbial radar of the media outlets. But the numbers appear to be very low.

And least we not forget, I still recall how the state of Wisconsin somehow 'forgot' to post negative test results late last summer, or the 83 positive tests of NFL plays that ALL turned out to be false positive. And then there are the stories of billing disincentives, misrepresented, mis-classified and re-calculated Covid death counts, and political incentives to shift, play up or ignore important mortality numbers to satisfy the narrative. And who can forget NY governor Cuomo, who ignored the Mercy ship beds he demanded, along with the beds he left empty in the Javits Center and the obsolete or unmaintained ventilators he so desperately demanded at the start of the first wave.

Then there is the entire 'flattening the curve' fiasco that commenced in earnest a year go, focusing on 'flattening' both Covid deaths and Covid intensive care unit bed use, and the promised two-week or thirty day 'lockdown' turned into weeks, than months, and now a year. And meanwhile, progressive politicians ignored the economic plight of the poorest Americans, dis-employing tens of millions, and then turning around to spend $1.9 trillion to combat the very poverty and joblessness they created.

And don't het me started on useless masks and arbitrary 'social distancing' mandates, none of which the political, media or professional sports elite seemed to think applied to them.

Perhaps the most interesting effect will be a decline in mortality rates in 2021 and 2022, reflecting the claim that Covid primarily accelerated deaths, especially deaths that had been 'delayed' with low flu death counts in the run-up years to 2020.