As 2022 ends, the yearly death totals are rolled out by various media outlets as a source of concern.
The Times reports 1,000 excess deaths each week as the NHS buckles, with 656,735 U.K. deaths in the last year. Using the pre-Covid five-year average, it notes, “50,000 more people died last year than normal”.
The BBC reported that 9% more people died in 2022 than in 2019. Within hours of the reports of the deaths, they concluded the “data indicates pandemic effects on health and NHS pressures are among the leading explanations”.
No need then for painstaking epidemiology, assessment of confounders and determination of causation as opposed to an association. The BBC has the answer. But does it?
One of its explanations is the “lasting effect of pandemic”. Pointing to a “number of studies that found people are more likely to have heart problems and strokes“.
All three studies cited are retrospective. The first is a review of those admitted to the hospital in 2020 (mean follow-up 140 days). The second is a review from 2020, comparing U.S. individuals in the Veteran Affairs program who were predominately white males with a positive Covid test with matched controls from 2017. The third was much the same, reporting excess risk in the four months after a positive test.
It is hard to infer that these studies inform lasting effects; the data are from 2020 (before vaccines were introduced), in selected populations (e.g., those admitted to hospital), with short-term follow-up (e.g., four months), in individuals infected with different variants to now, which as one of the reviews points out, “it is possible that the epidemiology of cardiovascular manifestations in COVID-19 might also change over time”, and finally biases due to the study type and selection of controls.
Underlying the BBC statements is the failure to separate the effects of SARS-CoV-2 infection (which the cited studies analyse) from those of restrictions. Why does the BBC conflate two separate possible causes?
But that’s not all. The BBC piece states, “some of this may be contributed to by the fact many people didn’t come in for screenings and non-urgent treatment during the peak of the pandemic”.
This refers to a pre-print paper by Dale et al. on the adverse impact of Covid on cardiovascular disease prevention and management in England, Scotland and Wales. The article reports that 491,203 fewer individuals initiated antihypertensive treatment from March 2020 to the end of May 2021 than expected, and estimated, based on the assumption that none of these received treatments, there could be 13,659 additional cardiovascular disease events (note, not deaths).
We have already reported that the NHS’s data show no decline in prescriptions for any cardiovascular drug since 2019. And we also discussed the Number Needed to Treat (NNT), which for five years of statin treatment in primary prevention is 138 to prevent one death.
The NNT for hypertension treatment, which treatment is for five years to prevent death, is 125. It, therefore, takes time for the effects of the undertreatment of hypertension to become apparent.
So let’s assume that the 500,000 in the Dale et al. paper were never treated. The NNT of 125 means we might expect to see 4,000 extra deaths from hypertensive-related diseases over the next five years.
This does not undermine the importance of blood pressure control. In the U.K., hypertension is the leading modifiable risk factor for heart disease.
The British Heart Foundation estimates 15 million adults have high blood pressure, of which roughly half are not receiving adequate treatment – a third (five million) are undiagnosed.
Furthermore, your risk of death is not just related to the identification of hypertension. Your age, the level of blood pressure and comorbidities make a substantial difference to the risk of death. None of this is accounted for in the retrospective analyses that dominate current research outputs.
The media cycle is designed to produce headlines: find the highest excess estimate and then find some reasons to explain it – job done. Yet, we previously showed estimates of non-Covid excess mortality using historic averages lead to 50-100% higher estimates than methods incorporating trends.
Asking for opinions only fuels speculation about what might be causing the excess. The days of ‘what we think…’ have to end. Evidence-based medicine is hard; it requires high-quality, detailed epidemiological studies. For example, it took a prospective study by Richard Doll to determine the effect of smoking on doctors – one of the largest risk factors for cardiovascular disease death – that followed-up participants for 50 years.
In August, we listed eight non-mutually exclusive causes that require investigating. We’re not sorry for repeating this, but we should test all of these before drawing conclusions.
Ascertainment of causation requires serious work, not inferences from studies taken out of their context or headline bait.
Dr. Carl Heneghan is the Oxford Professor of Evidence Based Medicine and Dr. Tom Jefferson is an epidemiologist based in Rome who works with Professor Heneghan on the Cochrane Collaboration. This article was first published on their Substack blog, Trust The Evidence, which you can subscribe to here.
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Well I think it’s time for a pertinent re-share, courtesy of ebygum ( muchas gracias for the giggles ).
“U.S. — Medical experts are absolutely stumped as to what could be causing the recent uptick in healthy, young people everywhere that are suddenly collapsing with heart failure. Despite their uncertainty, experts do feel confident that we can rule out that one thing as the culprit.
“It’s too early to say what could be causing this, but it’s never too early to say what isn’t causing this,” said local expert, Dr. Scott Rufflinger. “This could be caused by anything. But the one thing we know for certain is that it’s definitely not what we’re all thinking that’s behind this — if you know what I mean. We can go ahead and rule that thing out right now because Science just called us on the phone and told us not to discuss it. We always follow Science.”
https://babylonbee.com/news/experts-say-they-dont-know-what-thing-is-causing-everyone-to-suddenly-collapse-but-its-definitely-not-that-one-thing
Yes! I like their other recent one too:
https://babylonbee.com/news/9-surprising-benefits-of-the-vaccine
Congrats on the 600 upticks on your Brigden post yesterday BTW: is that a DS record?
I do love BB. They’re great for a bit of light relief!
Actually I haven’t been back to revisit that article today. I typically don’t look at previous days things unless I posted late and want to check responses. Well what can I say, I guess the resident Misogynist Society must be on vacation!
635 now! Back in January 2021, Freddie got over 350 upticks (net?) for his post on the first of January, “For The Fallen”. At the time, it was I think easily the highest and I assumed would remain so for quite a while. However, it seems it was beaten comfortably at least once., possibly in the 2,000 posts a day era or just after. It may have been around 600, or even some way higher than that. However it is quite complicated and time-consuming to check now, to the best of my knowledge. I remember at one point I had a post in the top ten, but slipped to much lower now!
“some of this may be contributed to by the fact many people didn’t come in for screenings and non-urgent treatment during the peak of the pandemic”.
So according to the BBC it’s the punters’ fault then, not the fact that numerous services – including routine screening/surgery – were curtailed and/or cancelled, people actively and aggressively discouraged from going to the GP/hospital and Fear (TM) manipulated to military levels of propaganda. There’s a thing.
(I do actually wonder if any lives will be saved as a result of less pharmaceutical intervention over the period, but that’s never going to be a viable area of research!)
I agree that diverting some blame on to the public is an aim here, and agree that lack of medication may have saved lives. I also echo the OP’s point, from long clinical experience, that a year or two of diminished screening and not starting preventive treatment is going to have no significant effect on mortality rates a year later.
The mainstream media, the medical establishment, and the political class are determined not to undertake the difficult work of understanding excess mortality causation because they fear the result will not be to their likening. They’re all utterly corrupt.
Of course, why else do the Times muppets refuse to instruct their journalist Oliver Wright to cover big pharma corruption?
I tell you what I dont get in all this.
The compliant Medical Professionals and teachers, Lawyers, Mainstream Media, HR Recruitment, Government workers (I will not include Politian’s for now in the list for their self-serving reasons), Union Leaders and their members etc…etc.. who have been medicated, did what they were told, bleated superiority or not etc… who perhaps have not been feeling their best (haven’t died suddenly yet). They MUST by now have a concern over the rumours that are trickling through the censor net – either social media, TV, interweb or what their bodies are telling them? Miscarriages, irregular bleeding, cancers.
I don’t know of any people in my circles who have “died suddenly” fortunately but I know a few who are off on some type of long-term sick leave and a few who simply don’t feel the same since being medicated.
When is the dam of concern going to break and when is the majority going to cry out to find out if they have been injected with a ticking time-bomb – or their children? Why are those who are able to communicate to the masses continue to stay silent and those that do communicate are ridiculed?
Stockholm syndrome?
They’re past the Stockholm syndrome stage I think. Now it’s a grim form of buyer’s remorse. I feel sure that in hindsight, even the most erstwhile Covidian can feel that they’ve been had. And the sense of having pushed harmful unnecessary untested drugs on your kids for the most ridiculous spurious reasons must be very hard to stomach. There’s a conspiracy of silence alright, but it’s amongst the victims as much as the perpetrators.
Berenson tweeted yesterday that practically everything they do now is borne out of sheer desperation and just an effort to shield themselves from any liability.
They now KNOW that they screwed up big time.
I’ve just investigated it. It’s the Covid vaccines.
Can I add the latest EuroMOMO data as evidence to support your conclusion?
https://euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/
The numbers just keep getting worse. After a pandemic there should be a period of below average deaths, no excess. The totals of excess deaths as measured by EuroMOMO today per the link are: –
2020 (pandemic year) 414,341
2021 374,733
2022 392,157
2022 includes excess deaths number of children 1,261 (0 to 14)
The statisticians at EuroMOMO write that the number above for children might be unreliable because they fixed the baseline after extrapolating a downward trend that was recorded during the years before 2020, which might not have been the correct approach to take. Oh, okay then, how do they explain the absolute number of children who died during week 49 2022, which was 468, as per today’s chart. That is the highest weekly deathly toll since at least the beginning of 2017 and would have qualified as substantial excess during 2017.
Andrew Bridgen just released a statement;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LD2lhNnlDbQ&ab_channel=AndrewBridgenMP
A good response from Bridgen. He sounds like a man who has come to the reluctant realisation that his party are no longer anything like the party he has supported and represented.
Yes I agree. It’s also great to hear of all the support he’s getting and that he’s not been put off in his quest to keep on asking the relevant and entirely reasonable questions, and in so doing, making the guilty, complicit buggers squirm. May he continue to be a thorn in the side of The Establishment and the people’s advocate in their pursuit for justice and change. I hope he acquires some influential allies along the way too, and that he’s making certain individuals search their consciences and to reassess which side of history they want to be on.
Thanks for the link. Thankfully, the part about reflexive holocaustism of the usual suspects is rather short. Part I feel like quoting here:
I owe that […] especially to our children and young people who are the future of our great nation.
The great nation is certainly debatable (I won’t do this here) but that’s the right attitude if it’s your nation.
Someone said Bridgen could be our Churchill , let’s hope so
Jeff Beck 78 RIP
Sudden Bacterial Meningitis!! 
18 year old high school student Jordan Brister dies suddenly after gym class following 21 year old and sixteen year old deaths this week
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/18-year-old-las-vegas-high-school-student-suddenly-and-unexpectedly-dies-cardiac-arrest-no
Blake Hounshell, a political reporter, died unexpectedly this week. He had been suffering from depression for a while. He was 44 years of age.https://www.conservativenewsdaily.net/breaking-news/top-new-york-times-journalist-dies-suddenly-at-44/
TikToker Waffler69 dies suddenly at age 33 from an apparent heart attack https://www.dexerto.com/entertainment/tiktoker-waffler69-dies-suddenly-at-age-33-2031386/
“Dies Suddenly” Strikes Again: Fit, Healthy 10-year-old Girl Dies Suddenly after Collapsing at School https://theamericantribune.com/dies-suddenly-strikes-again-fit-healthy-10-year-old-girl-dies-suddenly-after-collapsing-at-school/
Rugby league ‘star of the future’ Logan Holgate dies suddenly aged 18https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/rugby-league/breaking-rugby-logan-holgate-dead-28934261
So Carl what else was different about 2021, 2022 vs 2020? Age stratified deaths?
Lisa Marie Presley, 54, has been rushed to hospital after suffering a ‘full cardiac arrest https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11629129/Lisa-Marie-Presley-suffers-cardiac-arrest-rushed-hospital-given-CPR-home.html
But have no fear because Pfizer has a jab for that jab injury
The ‘vaccine’ uses the same technology as the company’s flagship Covid jab and is designed for people weeks or months after a heart attack to help them recover.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-11627695/Moderna-begins-trialing-mRNA-shot-injected-directly-HEART.html
The BBC isn’t in the business of investigative journalism or asking difficult questions of those in power.
It’s in the propaganda business and is best ignored.
https://twitter.com/ake2306/status/1613536775175028738?s=20&t=I1Rc-sLln_Ga01KGh8t1Iw
I intend to attend, despite the fact black is really not my colour
Totally agree that the excess deaths need proper investigation
In terms of the hypothesis that the experimental vaccines are the cause of a part or a significant part of these excess deaths, then for all its flaws we need the ONS to update its death by vaccination status report. But at the same time they need to do a reconciliation analysis between the ONS proportions vaccinated and NIMS proportions vaccinated to see where their analysis is faulty. Because of its inconsistencies it has to be faulty, we just don’t know how. It can’t be difficult to verify vax status of say 1000 people in the NIMS dataset at January 2021 against those in the ONS dataset and 1000 people in the ONS dataset at January 2021 against the NIMS dataset after which progress can be made
All we have on the ONS website at the moment is a note from 31 October 2022 saying
There will be a delay in publishing the next edition of the deaths by vaccination status dataset as we require data on subsequent booster vaccinations and will be updating to the 2021 Census populations. The next publication date will be announced on the release calendar when this is confirmed.
And Sarah Caul at the ONS is refusing to say when we will get the next vax status publication, she seems to be saying because they’ve put that notice on the website almost 3 months ago that’s OK. Meanwhile people are dying and in relation to the excess deaths we don’t know for sure why.
Even with the data integrity issues that have never been investigated, based on the last ONS report in July (up to May 2022 deaths) at least one age group the 90+ vaxed (any dose) were already experiencing from March 2022 higher all cause mortality than the 90+ unvaxed (see attached chart). Perhaps the position is much worse when the data issues are corrected, but until the data integrity issues are investigated we can’t know.