The Office for National Statistics has finally admitted that Britain is experiencing an ongoing excess deaths crisis in an article in the Lancet, coauthored with researchers from Imperial College London, the Department of Health and others. Disappointingly, however, the article is not an in-depth analysis of the causes of the deaths but just a one-page comment piece summarising the top-line stats and waving hands at what might be behind them. The authors call for “timely and granular analyses” to “describe such trends and so to inform prevention and disease management effort”. Which is odd, because that’s exactly what we’ve been asking them for for over two years now. After all, they’re the organisations with the data and resources to do it.
The article notes that there have been hundreds of excess deaths among young and middle-aged people every month in 2023 and suggests that the blame lies largely with the failing NHS. Other experts quoted by the Mail in its coverage of the piece point the finger at lifestyle factors including obesity and alcohol.
So now we’ve seen blamed: an ageing population (even though dementia deaths are running low), the after-effects of the virus (a possible contributor), an alleged drop in statin prescriptions during the pandemic (not borne out in the stats), healthcare waiting times (which don’t explain why it’s so busy in the first place) and now people themselves being blamed for eating and drinking too much. But there’s one thing everyone is absolutely sure can’t be responsible, and that’s the rushed, experimental genetic vaccines taken multiple times by anyone at risk of ending up in hospital with a respiratory virus (and almost everyone else too) – jabs that clinical trials and subsequent studies found to be associated with unusually high numbers of serious adverse effects. No, it can’t possibly be that.
From the Mail.
Hundreds more middle-aged Brits are dying every month than expected, with experts blaming unhealthy lifestyles and the NHS crisis for the surge in excess deaths.
An extra 28,000 deaths, or more than 1,000 a week, were logged across the U.K. in the first six months of the year, according to fresh analysis of official figures.
The spike in mortality is especially stark among people aged 50 to 64, with 15% more dying than usual.
Most of these deaths were caused by largely preventable illnesses, including heart disease, liver damage and diabetes.
Experts pointed to Britain’s ever-expanding waistline and alcohol intake, as well as the beleaguered health service for failing to treat patients fast enough.
Data from the Office for National Statistics show 353,047 fatalities were recorded between January and June this year.
This is 28,024, or 8.6%, more than the 325,023 expected over that period.
Excess deaths, sometimes known as extra deaths, are the number of deaths that are above the average for the same period in previous years.
Separate data from the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID) show that, in the year to June, 15% more 50 to 64-year-olds died than expected.
There were 64,268 deaths among the group, compared to the 55,861 expected — meaning there were an extra 8,407 fatalities in a year, or around 700 per month.
An analysis of the data, published in the Lancet, also noted that more people are dying at homes rather than hospitals.
During the pandemic, excess deaths were focused among older adults.
But there is now a pattern of “persisting excess deaths which are most prominent in relative terms in middle-aged and younger adults”, the authors wrote.
“Timely and granular analyses are needed to describe such trends and so to inform prevention and disease management efforts,” they added. …
The report noted that cardiovascular disease was one of the leading causes of excess deaths, while liver disease, acute respiratory infections and diabetes were also fuelling the trend.
Anti-vaxxers have claimed excess deaths are down to Covid jabs but scientists insist that the injections, which have saved tens of millions of lives globally, are not to blame.
Writing in the Times, Professor Yvonne Doyle, former Medical Director of the now-defunct Public Health England (PHE), blamed “an underlying pandemic of ill health”.
She said the spike was driven by heart disease, diabetes and cirrhosis — all of which are highly preventable and driven by lifestyle choices, such as an unhealthy diet and drinking too much alcohol.
“Unless access to preventive and early treatment improves, these causes of death will continue, and be joined by cancer,” Professor Doyle warned.
She noted that the U.K. is faring worse that many other wealthy countries in the fight against poor health and criticised the Covid inquiry for focusing “solely on tactical decision-making by political leaders”.
Worth reading in full.
Meanwhile, Steve Kirsch reports on his email exchange with the ONS’s Sarah Caul (one of the Lancet article coauthors) where she explains where the mortality data can be obtained and he asks for her help in obtaining and analysing them (no reply as yet).
Separately, Professors Norman Fenton and Martin Neil explain on their website what data are needed to answer the vaccine question definitively, responding to a request put to them by David Davis MP at the Parliamentary meeting on vaccines on December 4th. (Read Dr. Pierre Kory’s account of that meeting here.)
Will either Steve or Norman now, finally, get the data they are requesting from the ONS?
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