As I noted on Monday, internationally comparable mortality data – specifically, estimates of life expectancy – are now available in most countries for the years 2020 and 2021. These allow us to see which countries fared worse and which fared best during the pandemic.
Unsurprisingly, the picture hasn’t changed much since all we had to go on was excess deaths. Still, the life expectancy estimates are easier to interpret and are therefore worth digging into.
The chart below plots life expectancy from 2000 to 2021 in three countries that represent the full spectrum of human mortality: Japan, India and Central African Republic.
Interestingly, the pandemic had no discernible impact on Japanese life expectancy, which increased year-on-year in both 2020 and 2021. By contrast, Indian life expectancy fell by a total of 3.7 years. In Central African Republic, life expectancy fell by only 0.8 years.
Perusing the figures for a large number of countries, there seems to be a general pattern whereby middle-income countries like India saw larger declines in life expectancy than low-income countries like Central African Republic. In other words: high-income countries saw the smallest declines; low-income countries saw intermediate declines; and middle-income countries saw the largest declines.
The comparatively small declines seen in high-income countries are presumably due to factors like better healthcare systems and earlier vaccination of the elderly. But why the intermediate – as opposed to large – declines in low-income countries?
One possible explanation is that the data aren’t very good and a lot of deaths were simply missed. Another is that because Covid disproportionately targets the old, and there were fewer old people in these countries to begin with, the number at risk of dying was lower. A third explanation is that most low-income countries are concentrated in Africa, where the population may have higher levels of immunity.
One reason to doubt the last explanation is that South Africa is in Africa, and it saw a much larger decline in life expectancy than the continent as a whole (shown above). Consistent with the second explanation, South Africa has a higher median age than most of its neighbours.
Contrary to some earlier evidence, particularly hard-hit countries from the middle-income bracket can be found on all four major continents, as the graph below indicates.
Unsurprisingly, high-income countries fared best during the pandemic. But interestingly, it was middle-income countries that fared worst; although this may be partly due to poor data quality in low-income countries.
Stop Press: Statistician Nigel Jacklin has looked at the European mortality date for 2017-22 and concludes there’s not much difference between the years 2017-19 and 2020-22. You can read his post on LinkedIn here.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
Net Zero Winters Will Kill – latest leaflet to print at home and deliver to neighbours or forward to politicians, your new MP, your local vicar, online media and friends online. Start a local campaign. We have over 200 leaflet ideas on the link on the leaflet.
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3290562/china-russia-ties-xi-jinping-tells-medvedev-beijing-seeks-political-solution-ukraine
Dmitri Medvedev stated that “sober minds in the West are ready for dialogue with “United Russia
So it is now clear that there will be an outbreak of peace shortly in Europe and that the first ever invasion of a nuclear power by its neighbour may not result in a cataclysmic global self immolation by the bunch of monkeys that calls itself ‘mankind’
That is just as well for the particular simians in Westminster who have managed to contrive it, at this most dangerous juncture, that only two of the only six British air defence assets that have some remote chance of destroying incoming ballistic missiles are presently operational.
Well done Major, Blair, Brown, Cameron, Clegg, May, Johnson, Truss, Sunak, Starmer…a more complete bunch of baboons would be hard to imagine….
https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/two-of-six-type-45-destroyers-currently-operational/
That notwithstanding, in response to the Russian anthropoid sub species visiting their related Asian simian sub species, the Asian great apes mumbled the following:
‘China will continue to work to create “favourable conditions for a political solution” to the Ukraine crisis, President Xi Jinping said while vowing to strengthen “strategic synergy” with Russia, according to state broadcaster CCTV.
Meeting former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev in Beijing on Thursday, Xi repeated Beijing’s position on the Ukraine war, saying China “repeatedly stressed” the need to adhere to three principles – “no expansion of the battlefields, no escalation of hostilities and no fanning flames” – to strive for a swift de-escalation.
Medvedev said Russia took China’s position on the Ukraine issue “positively”, noted the “Friends of Peace” group initiative proposed by China, Brazil and other countries, and was willing to “actively push for a political solution” to the Ukrainian crisis, according to CCTV.
According to Russia’s Tass news agency, Medvedev said Russia was ready for peace talks with Ukraine, but only if Kyiv understood the realities on the ground.’
Peace in our time, then?
Best cut a deal now before oil slips to $40/barrel…….
“Simplicius” pointed out how Russia should learn from the downfall of Syria:
… the unexpected upheaval of this event could act towards re-centering Russian priorities in Ukraine by giving a dose of reality to not only how quickly situations can change, but how dangerously ‘loaded’ unattended frozen conflicts can turn out to be. Russia must win the Ukraine war decisively, because the Empire is clearly not done yet and is going out swinging on all fronts.
But RussiansWithAttitude said it well enough so that I don’t have to:
False Peace is Death. A bad faith ceasefire is a recipe for disaster and after Minsk and Astana should never be repeated. False peace is worse than war, because false peace means you still have to fight the war later, but at a disadvantage. No green busses or green corridors for the enemy, no deescalation zones, no freezing of any lines. The enemy has to be defeated completely: victory is a prerequisite for mercy. Until that is achieved, no ceasefires, only death under FABs.
Collapse is always sudden. The Assad regime resisted NATO-Israeli aggression for 13 years. And then it fell in a week. Mistakes, systemic errors and structural attrition accumulate until a critical mass is reached, and at that point the smallest impact will bring down the entire house of cards. Likewise, our current enemy in the main theater will resist stubbornly, until he will not be able to anymore, and then we will see Big Arrows. All our efforts should be focused on damaging the enemy’s war-waging capabilities to reach that critical point.
Infantry is King. A single full-sized, dependable Russian infantry brigade (or a Ukrainian one, for that matter) would have been able to defeat the Jihadi advance for good. They were completely overstretched and to a large degree their offensive was a bluff that only worked because the SAA didn’t even try to resist, they just ran. We had our own experience with a lack of infantry in the SMO — it led to the Kharkov oblast debacle in fall ’22. No matter what anyone says, no matter what technological advances there are, the infantry unit was and remains the central actor of history, upon which all else depends.
The foregoing circumstances could act as a catalyst to remind Russia of the existentiality of the current global conflict. The stakes are everything and Russian leadership may now see just how critical it is to make sure that the West is decisively defeated in Ukraine.
Very pertinent. Simplicius is an outstanding commentator. Thank you for posting.
The outstanding success of the U.S. strategy to weaken Russia, coupled with pressure from China, is now having demonstrable effect.
Orbán had a phone conversation with Putin in the middle of the week, lasting over an hour. Minister of FA Szijjártó then asked Zelensky to speak with Orbán.
The Ukrainian president, declined the request.
“Streeting vows to root out NHS antisemitism”
With considerably more vigour than he is rooting out sloth and waste, I presume..?
They also have a thing about rooting out Christians, and another thing about rooting out ‘Islamaphobia’, Transphoia, and a bunch of other phobias and -isms. The point I was trying to make was that so far, other than providing death to already terminally ill patients, our ‘Broken NHS’ (Streetings words) appears not to have taken any of his time up in formulating ways of improving the provision of healthcare in the UK.
“Keir Starmer’s ‘surrender squad’ to undo Brexit:
So we can enjoy the same economic benefits as the rest of Europe..? This obsession with the EU as some kind of Utopia and the desire of which is the mark of moral and intellectual superiority makes me vomit.
Just another example of Kneel’s traitorous behaviour.
We need to keep repeating this – the Prime Minister is a traitor.
“Where Ed Miliband is plotting to build one billion solar panels across Britain”
Breath-taking folly.
“Heat pumps and solar panels may be forced on listed buildings”
This ‘thing’ Ed Milibrain has no care for the preservation of history or humanity
All he cares about is his future legacy of being remembered as the green god who saved the world!
Reality is he’ll be remembered as the biggest fool in politics and his legacy will be taught in schools as a text book case of what piety and arrogance can destroy
The people had better make sure there’s a Reform government next if they want to undo the damage being done.
There is no such thing as “impossible to undo.” Anybody pushing that crap is as dishonest as those pushing the idea in the first place.
Correct, parliament makes the laws parliament can disolve the laws
This Ba$tardised government does not set our children’s futures in stone just because they got in for 5 years!
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2024/12/14/number-civilians-killed-gaza-inflated-to-vilify-israel/
Finally, evidence to back up what has long been suspected.
‘An independent, volunteer-based group of researchers spanning from Australia to California, operating without organizational or private sponsorship, has investigated Gaza casualty figures.’
‘Systematic omission of combatant casualty information has led to a misleading narrative suggesting that Israel has killed “40,000 civilians” in Gaza. This narrative receives widespread media coverage. For instance, prominent television host Fareed Zakaria stated on CNN in April that “35,000 civilians died” during an interview with Bennett, who notably did not challenge this characterization’
‘….frequently citing numbers from the ‘Gaza Ministry of Health’ as though it was a fully independent, unbiased source. In reality, the Ministry of Health (MoH) is under the full control of Hamas.
Serious errors have been discovered on the Ministry’s lists of fatalities. These errors include a 22-year-old registered as a four-year-old, a 31-year-old registered as a one-year-old and several men with male first names registered as female – artificially increasing the numbers of women and children reported killed. The lists also include people who died before the war and people who died from attacks by Hamas rather than the Israel Defence Forces.’
‘…include around 5,000 natural deaths per year, including cancer patients who were listed by the Ministry for hospital treatment after they had already appeared on fatality lists. Hamas also claimed hundreds of fatalities from attacks which turned out to be misfired rocket launches by Gaza factions.’
So a bunch of Bonobos wearing silly hats, making weird noises, have been causing traffic chaos in London, claiming millions of pounds of expenses from their various trade unions to demonstrate based on a load of old confected nonsense……well done…….not……how fecking stupid……..
Completely bananas……
Key Findings
Men listed as women to inflate female fatalities. Analysis of Gaza Ministry of Health (MoH)
Fatality data reveals repeated instances of men being misclassified as women. Examples include individuals with male first names (e.g. Mohammed) being recorded as female. This misclassification contributes to the narrative that civilian populations, particularly women and children, bear the brunt of the conflict, potentially influencing international sentiment and
media coverage.
Adults registered as children. Significant discrepancies have been uncovered where adult fatalities are reclassified as children. For instance, an individual aged 22 was listed as a fouryear-old and a 31-year-old was listed as an infant. Such distortions inflate the number of child casualties, which is emotionally impactful and heavily emphasised in global reporting.
These misrepresentations suggest a deliberate attempt to frame the conflict as disproportionately affecting children, undermining the credibility of the fatality data.
Disproportionate deaths of fighting-age men. Data analysis indicates that most fatalities are men aged 15–45, contradicting claims that civilian populations are being disproportionately
targeted.
This age demographic aligns closely with the expected profile of combatants, further supported by spikes in deaths of men reported by family sources rather than hospitals.
This evidence suggests that many fatalities classified as civilian may be combatants, a distinction
omitted from official reporting.
Inclusion of natural deaths in reporting.
Despite the typical annual rate of 5,000 natural deaths in Gaza, the fatality data provides no accounting for such figures. This omission raises concerns that natural deaths, as well as deaths caused by internal violence or misfired rockets,
are being included in war-related fatality counts. Instances of cancer patients, previously registered for treatment, appearing on war fatality lists further support this assertion.
Such practices inflate the reported civilian death toll, complicating accurate assessments of the conflict’s impact.
Media underreporting of combatant deaths. Analysis of media coverage reveals that only 3% of news stories reference combatant deaths, with outlets like the BBC, CNN, Reuters and The New York Times primarily relying on Gaza Ministry of Health figures. These figures often lack verification and fail to distinguish between combatants and civilians.
The omission creates a skewed narrative that portrays all casualties as civilian, thus shaping public opinion and
international policy based on incomplete or manipulated data.
How many weeks ago was it that USA ‘celebrated’ their 500th cargo aircraft delivery of weapons to Israel? How many bombs does that make? How many 2,000lb bombs has Israel dropped on Gaza? How much assistance has Israel had in its murderous and destructive bombing campaigns from UK?
Would you like to read the report “Our Job Is to Flatten Gaza. No One Will Stop Us”: Inside One Israeli Battalion’s Yearlong Mission Of Destruction on https://www.dropsitenews.com/?
Or would you like to read this report extolling the work of an Israeli sniper team in Gaza: https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/us-nonprofit-raising-money-israeli-sniper-unit? You may even donate to their cause!
You can also add up the death count that https://antiwar.com/ provides on a daily basis or simply admire the multitude of photographs showing the widespread destruction and suffering caused by the Israelis.
Professional reporters (I think it was last week that Israel celebrated killing its 192nd reporter in Gaza) estimate the number of deaths in Gaza to be over 300,000. How many do you think there are? 10? 20?
Would you like to go there and count yourself? Good luck!
And you could get the impression Israel does not like reporters. Now, why is that?
Bit hard for the jew haters to understand
.
I am baffled as to why there have not been any “covid deaths” recorded in gaza.
A definitive figure of fatalities is impossible, due to the lack of transparency from the MoH, a general lack of access to the Palestinian Population Registry and the challenges of counting militants killed in combat. However, this report finds numerous errors that cannot be explained by a lack of access to the Ministry of Health computer network that went offline in November 2023.
Our investigation found numerous statistical anomalies in the MoH’s fatality lists, including significant daily increases in the reported deaths of women and children that are mathematically impossible.
Furthermore, the inclusion of natural deaths in war-related fatality counts, the erroneous categorisation of men as women and children, and the failure to account for deaths caused by internal Palestinian violence or misfired rockets from Gaza have all contributed to
inflated and misleading numbers.
This report highlights the broader implications of such data distortion. International Humanitarian Law requires that warring parties take measures to minimise civilian harm, but the distortion of fatality data undermines efforts to assess compliance with these
laws.
The absence of credible data also hampers international responses, humanitarian aid efforts and peace negotiations. Without accurate and reliable figures, it becomes nearly
impossible to understand the full scope of the conflict’s impact or to hold parties accountable for their actions.
While it is crucial to acknowledge the suffering and loss of life in Gaza, the uncritical repetition of unverified fatality figures serves to obscure the truth rather than illuminate it. The MoH’s
fatality reports, in their current form, should not be treated as definitive, nor should they be used as the primary basis for international discourse on the conflict.
This situation calls for a more measured approach in reporting and analysis, one that critically examines sources of
information and distinguishes between legitimate and manipulated data.
Responsible reporting requires more than simply relaying numbers. It demands a critical assessment of the data, an understanding of the context and a commitment to accuracy.
The international media plays a crucial role in shaping global perceptions of the conflict. Only by approaching these figures with a critical eye can the media help uncover the truth behind the war’s human cost, ensuring that the true nature of the conflict is represented in the reporting of it.
Just where are you copying this nonsense from and what is your purpose in doing so? You seem to be mocking the countless deaths that Israel has incurred on the Palestinian population.
I have been unable to access the PCBS (Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics) website for some time now which hardly surprises me: I assume some Israeli tank or bomb just blew their office to smithereens.
They openly admitted their 45,000 deaths were only ‘Martyrs’, i.e. people killed directly by Israeli fire. Their only source of information were the hospitals, which remain(ed) prime targets of Israel’s onslaught. Thus those people were never counted who died of hunger, cold, lack of medical support, or who were/are buried under the ubiquitous rubble of destroyed houses and villages.
Anyone who has been following the reporting made by such sites as https://antiwar.com/, https://electronicintifada.net/, https://thegrayzone.com/, https://www.ukcolumn.org/, etc., will be well aware of the obviously very high number of casualties, as well as being equally aware of the impossibility of an exact count while the conflict continues.
That Israel is guilty of massive extirpation of human life is, however, clear and cannot to be denied. Any attempt to ridicule or downplay the hundreds or several tens of thousands of deaths is severely reprehensible.
This report raises serious concerns that the Gaza MoH figures have been overstated.
The data behind their figures contains natural deaths, deaths from before this conflict began and deaths of those killed by Hamas itself; it contains no mention of Hamas combatant fatalities; and it overstates the number of women and children killed.
Serious errors have been discovered on the Ministry’s lists of fatalities. These errors include a 22-year-old registered as a four-year-old, a 31-year-old registered as a one-year-old and several men with male first names registered as female – artificially increasing the numbers of women and children reported killed.
The lists also include people who died before the war and people who died from attacks by Hamas rather than the Israel Defence Forces.
Incredible: European Committee gives green light to use self-replicating mRNA vaccines on citizens of EU countries: https://expose-news.com/2024/12/15/green-light-to-use-self-replicating-vaccines-in-eu/.
It is becoming clear that the real purpose of any injection is to stuff bodies with self-replicating mRNA and any “disease” will do.
Yes, these people are truly determined to wipe out mankind.