An unresolved puzzle of the pandemic is why COVID-19 death rates have been so low in East Asia. We know this can’t be due to different ways of counting COVID-19 deaths because it shows up in comparisons of excess mortality.
The most recent published estimates of excess mortality, taken from a paper in eLife by Ariel Karlinsky and Dmitry Kobak, are shown below. In this analysis, excess deaths since the start of the pandemic are given as a percentage of annual baseline mortality (see grey numbers).
Excess mortality in Europe ranges from –4% in Norway to 43% in North Macedonia, and most countries are in the 10–30% range. In East Asia, by contrast, excess mortality ranges from –11% in Mongolia to 4% in Hong Kong. (Note: excess deaths in East Asia may have increased slightly in more recent months.)
As I’ve argued before, it’s unlikely this difference is due to lockdowns as Japan has seen negative excess mortality despite having some of the least restrictive policies in the world. In 2020, for example, there were zero days of mandatory business closures and zero days of mandatory stay-at-home orders.
So what can explain East Asia’s low COVID death rates? One factor that’s often mentioned on social media is their low rates of obesity. As I’ll explain, however, this can’t explain more than a small part of the difference between East Asia and the rest of the world.
To begin with, obesity’s effect on the risk of death from COVID-19 – conditional upon on infection – is actually quite modest. (By comparison, the effect of age is enormous.)
While it’s often said that most COVID-19 patients in the U.S. are overweight or obese, this is isn’t very surprising. After all, most U.S. adults are overweight or obese. For example, a CDC study published in March found that 50.8% of COVID-19 patients were obese. Yet the figure for adults as a whole is only slightly lower, at 42.4%.
Earlier this year, the BBC radio program More or Less (which deals with statistics in the news) calculated that if the global obesity rate dropped to zero, the total number of COVID-19 deaths would fall by only 7%.
If you look at the chart above, there is no obvious clustering of highly obese countries on the first two rows. For example, the obesity rate in Peru – which has seen excess mortality of 153% – is less than one in five.
What’s more, two recent studies estimated that there have been around 4 million excess deaths in India. This equates to excess mortality of around 40%, which would place India on the top row of the chart above. Yet the country has an obesity rate of only 3.9% – one of the lowest in the world.
All this suggests that something other than lack of obesity explains the low COVID-19 death rates in East Asia.
Stop Press: For an alternative view on the relationship between obesity and COVID mortality, see this post on Swiss Policy Research.
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Don’t believe a word of it, just a bit more good cop, bad cop bullshit fed to the media to assuage fears. They all want this, every single one of them.
They tend to talk tough and then wimp out when it matters. Still perhaps better than Starmer and his party of useless turds.
“The Opposition” will support it no doubt.
Indeed, Baker will blubber about it, then go ahead and vote for it, or for another permanent extension of the temporary state of emergency.
I’m hoping this is the issue that forces Tory MP’s to wake up and realise just how far Johnson has pushed the envelope of overreach. This is an existential crisis. They must ask themselves: Are we Conservatives or Communists?
Medical apartheid, a biosecurity state cannot be permitted. Period
Most of them are, first and foremost, party animals. They will vote for whatever puts the most swill in their trough.
All of them, not most; if they weren’t they wouldn’t be MPs because the sheeple cannot think for themselves and are incapable of assessing the worth of independent candidates. As things are, with unqualified universal suffrage, membership of one of the big parties is a sine qua non for a political career, unless you wish to represent Brighton and Hove.
Snout trough
They are Globalists following the WEF agenda.
Dream on
Yes it’s all bollox regardless of what they want I want a fight a nasty one with lots of fucking claret !
I want trials for treason or misconduct in office or something else we can hang them for, lots of them, with lots of executions.
It’s shocking it’s only 50 MPs
There’s always a cabinet rift, but the all rubber stamp the ongoing tyranny
NHS made secret pandemic plan to deny care to elderly
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/07/30/nhs-made-secret-pandemic-plan-deny-care-elderly/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr
Stand in South Hill Park Bracknell every Sunday from 10am meet fellow anti lockdown freedom lovers, keep yourself sane, make new friends and have a laugh.
Join our Stand in the Park – Bracknell – Telegram Group
http://t.me/astandintheparkbracknell
More horrifying Corona Committee hearing revelations here:
https://www.bitchute.com/video/Ru1LgeeTkZBI/
Fkinhell, here’s the FDA document from October 2020 where they already knew what the serious adverse events from the vaccine would be before the rollout. Is this for real?
https://www.fda.gov/media/143557/download
Thank you for posting, prod-s. Still gobsmacked!
Courtesy of Victoria from her link on Today’s Update
https://www.nhsx.nhs.uk/covid-19-response/using-the-nhs-covid-pass/#exemptions
Not more of this shit – the fucking lanyards were bad enough!
The people who vote for this will eventually be regarded and judged by history in the same vein as those who voted for the Jim Crow laws and for the Ermaechtigungsgesetz in 1933 or the Nuremberg Rassengesetz in 1935.
Their descendants will be ashamed of them forever.
A pity that only 50 Tories have any grasp of history and/or an intact moral compass.
You’re right. In days to be, membership of the abject Covid parliament will be considered a mark of shame and criminality, comparable to membership of the SS.
Though one wonders why Piffle doesn’t have a grasp of history.
Why just “history” – his grasp of most things is being manipulated by his appalling wife…
BIG BLUBBER is a spoilt brat grown big. The only thing he needs to understand is how to get what he is entitled to and what fuss to make when he doesn’t.
He does.
I hope that you’re right, given that history is written by the victors.
What if this time they do get communism right? I.e. make it stick.
To paraphrase Churchill, history will think well of them because they will write it. History is what historians say it is and not an incontrovertibly factual record of the past.
Assuming this is true, which seems quite plausible, we know there are some in the cabinet who are not complete COVID lunatics. I think we can guess who. It’s a very small crumb of comfort, but it’s something
The interesting thing is that all pretence that any of what they are doing is now “following the science” has gone out of the window. The debate is purely political. Of course we know it has been political since the start
CDC study shows 74% of people infected in Massachusetts Covid outbreak were fully vaccinated. Vaccinations are ineffective and unsafe. Vaccine passports serve no purpose when the vaccinated are the main carriers of covid.https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/30/cdc-study-shows-74percent-of-people-infected-in-massachusetts-covid-outbreak-were-fully-vaccinated.html
But still they say that Delta affects the unvaccinated worse even though 74% are vaccinated. I think we can be more than fairly sure that the spokesperson is talking utter bollocks.
Wont be long before the twice injected turn on the once injected and then the thrice injected turn on the twice injected etc………Classic divide and rule.
Not too sure whether the thrice vaccinated will be in any condition to turn on anybody.
Quite a number of the twice vaccinated near to us, seem to developing a host of new ailments. Just a coincidence, of course!
i hear that. I know more injected people who have had a range of side effects including a death from the thing than those who have had it but currently seem ok
The future number 1 one cause of death: coincidence.
Reminds me of the classic line from Casablanca.
‘I came here for the waters’
We have all been misinformed.
hard to believe that a low mortality virus/pandemic has created such utter madness. Johnson should ignore what the segregation team are proposing, its not British
Johnson is the problem, not the solution.
Just been researching the vax passport exemptions. It’s wide open. You can self-declare your exemption and no one is allowed to ask for proof. Same as the masks.
It’s bizarre.
Some questions arise:
Does this thereby extend to tests, as it should, and if so, which ones (not)?
What are the international/travelling implications (tests, quarantines, inbound, outbound, acceptance of health passport abroad vs non acceptance of UK exemption abroad)?
Does this provide a way out from ‘no jab, no job’?
Does this provide a way out for care workers and all others where vaccination was or might still be mandated by a separate law?
If the health passport isn’t demanded as proof but the vaccination (document) itself, as likely in the case of private employers, does the same self-exemption option apply (as with masks, otherwise they’d have to formulate their own exemption rules, which must not run foul of the disability act)?
Is it in danger of becoming abolished and changed, or is this watertight for good, due to being based upon and due to common law?
I am sure that there is more, but certainly, this is the best news in quite a while.
I doubt that it will be left as open as the masks thing, especially for international travel and abroad, but even if it is, we’re not safe and we cannot rest until the whole concept and the Big Lie that is behind it is exposed for the evil nonsense it is.
Ideally, people whether they are vaxxed or unvaxxed should simply refuse to take part in any such arrangements. But I can understand people who do, for personal reasons – it won’t be easy for all to opt out.
You’re right – I note that self declaration is available only until the digital framework is available on the NHS Covid Pass App
…however, those without smartphones would surely have to rely on self-declaration otherwise large parts of society would be prohibited.
Can you share that research? Which form of VaxPaz? As far as I’m aware we’re only using it for international travel at the moment, without exemptions.
It might be this:
https://www.nhsx.nhs.uk/covid-19-response/using-the-nhs-covid-pass/
But just as with the masks, it’ll create a nasty, confrontational atmosphere which causes people to just think ‘fuck it’ and not bother to go to places where they might get challenged. And it’ll be the same as masks with jobsworths demanding “proof”.
Hi have you got a link(s)
Dominic Raab wrote a book in 2009 called The Assault on Liberty. I shan’t be reading it.
No point, it’s being played out right in from of us.
The script for what is happening now?
Let’s look at real the World affects of an “Investigatory” emergency use prophylactic:
https://gab.com/vaccineregrets
The narrative is changing. The question is why?
At some point there will be a realisation amongst the big money people, that bigger money can be made out of the absence of a “pandemic” than can be made out of the ongoing presence of one, and then it will all be over.
Big Pharma, Amazon, laptop suppliers, and assorted other multinationals have done very well indeed out of the past 18 months – they won’t be in any hurry for this to end.
Doublethink has a specific purpose: it destroys the ability to think rationally.
The CDC is actually up to triplethink now:
Vaccine passports are needed to segregate the diseased from the pure.
and
Vaccines protect the pure from the diseased.
and
Muzzles are needed to protect the pure from the pure.
If you can believe all those things are true at once, then your social credit score will remain intact, for now. If you feel a twinge of cognitive dissonance, best keep it to yourself.
“Another added: “My concern is that this is destabilising the party. A carrot approach is far better than a stick approach. We shouldn’t be taking people’s liberties away, we should be encouraging them.”
So in short:
And there we have it. The gaping moral vacuum at the heart of the Conservative Party.
Not that the Labour Party is any better.
We need the old Establishment to be dissolved, preferably with nitric acid, and a new Establishment put in its place. One that serves the country, not itself.
“The biggest concern of Conservative MPs is the wellbeing of the Conservative Party, not the wellbeing of the country.”
Yep. same with Labour MP’s, by and large too, as you say. Toe the party line, be good boys & girls, because they’re thinking about their long term political future. Now there is an inherit flaw in this method, which may be worth reminding your MP of because I feel many will have overlooked — the flaw is, it depends upon the party remaining in existence long enough, so that said spineless waste of space MP can realize their future vision!
Hydrofluoric acid would be even better, it is toxic and even dissolves glass.
The peasants are revolting!
When the AFP/Guardian are reporting over 200000 are on the streets of France, you know its more than 2million. When they say the protests are growing, you know they are becoming scared!
And when they try to say that out of that under 15000 were in Paris, you know they are lying and are becoming very scared!
Perhaps Emmanuel Jean-Michel Frédéric would like to stay in Polynesia.
Today Albi, tomorrow Toulouse. Next week Gaillac and Graulhet ( that is where I will be).
Liberté, égalité, fraternité!
The French protesters are our best hope – they can bring down the regime and that will be the first domino to fall.
There were at least 1.2 million in France today. Possibly more, but that’s a safe figure
Facts and data, not narrative and Nudge Unit Psyops.
I see our glorious leader is doing his bit for climate change and the problem of overpopulation by producing yet another sprog. More, do as I say, not as I do from the fat controller.
She’s a scrubber.
He’s old fat and ill
It’s not his.
So if you get your vaccine you can get a free pizza. You’ll still be able to spread it and get it but you’ll have a pizza
Yep. Not sure what the stats are in the UK, but the US CDC says the overwhelming majority (over 75%) of people who were hospitalized or died from covid, were classified as obese… but here, have a donut, taco, king size cheeseburger, pizza, as you say, with your vaxxine — and contribute to rising obesity levels!
What a sad shambles of a government. Here they are, talking about forcing people to undergo unwanted and unnecessary medical procedures, and all the Tories could muster were 50 dissenters… wow…
Speaking of which, imagine the precedent. Imagine if instead of a vaccine we were talking about double D cup sizes. “The Prime Minister has announced today that all women must now have at least a double D cup size in order to qualify for the new boob passport. The PM has further encouraged all large venues, as well as pubs and restaurants, to check everyone’s boob passport and not allow any woman on the premises with a cup size smaller than a double D.” I wonder if people would still be like: “Look, a boob job is harmless. Besides, no one is forcing you to do it. It’s your choice that you don’t want to be allowed into pubs or restaurants…”
“Look, nobody forced you to be homosexual. You could have chosen not to be at any point. Now put on this pink triangle and get in the cattle truck. It’s OK, we passed a law.”
I would support this 100% tbh
Coerced “vaccination” is akin to rape within a relationship, this being a relationship with the government. Those forcing this are no better than rapists.
It doesn’t bother Boris anyway – he knows Labour will support it so the party rebels are worthless.
The complete and utter lack of *any* formal opposition party means he can do whatever the hell he wants.
If those 50MPs felt strongly enough the one thing they could do that would force Boris into listening would be send a letter to the 1922 asking for a leadership contest.
They wont though – they don’t want to lose the cushy job and perks.
Who would take over as leader? Be careful what you wish for. A lot would depend on who the rank and file thought was most electable. Unlikely to be a sceptic. And the PM may well win any such contest.
It would make a shit they are all cunts
I am more optimistic than you Splattt. I bet a fair few letters have gone in already and the trickle will become a flood if BJ and Gove try to push a vaccine passport through Parliament
Its the Covid social credit pass hokey cokey.
We will, we won’t we will, we won’t . All part of the Johnson regime strategy to play with our heads, they won’t stop until they have pleased their Chinese and billionaire masters.
Too much money at stake
This is all theatre. There are no opposition to this. Its a ploy to get people thinking there is hope.
Irrelevant, now that Sir Forensic has slithered off the fence onto the side of Social Credit Score Apps. His position is that they are necessary but not sufficient, and he also wants the biosurveillance to reveal whether we have been tested for the Chinese Virus recently.
They’re coming, chaps, all that remains to be decided is the final name. I’m guessing something nicely newspeak like CitPass or FreeCert.
Raab and Shapps should be taken to the court of Human Rights for their illegal actions
https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/over-100k-breakthrough-cases-kept-quiet-cdc-says-vaxed-can-spread-infection-same-as-unvaxed/
Just watched the health minister of NewSouth Wales going through a ‘scare-um’ list of cases, hospitalisations, intensive care admissions, and ventilated patients, he ended up with the admission that all except one were double vaccinated, the one was only single vaccinated.
All those double vaccinated would get a uk vaccine passport.
Not only that but where breakthrough cases are identified by rtPCR tests ct is <20 so the have high viral load a.k.a. they are highly infectious.
The only reason to give a health passport is if it indicates the holder is not infectious.
I can’t be the only one whose eyes skip over the words ‘Tory Rebellion’, or similar, in just the way my ears mute the muzak in supermarkets?
Hah – trick question. It is, of course, (c) Carrie-on.
“There are concerns across the cabinet about denying people their freedoms.”
Really?! What just ‘concerns’?! And just ‘freedoms’?! How about health and lives and livelihoods and humanity and security and and and.