There is an ongoing debate on Jay Bhattacharya and Rav Arora’s Illusion of Consensus Substack, which concerns the recent claim made by Bret Weinstein on the Tucker Carlson show that up to 17 million people worldwide may have died as a direct result of the Covid vaccination campaigns.
This estimate was disputed by Danish scientist Tracy Beth Høeg, and her analysis featured in a recent Daily Sceptic article here.
What immediately caught my eye in her article was the chart from Professor John Ioannidis showing the excess deaths of a variety of countries during the Covid period. This chart showed Denmark very near the bottom with no excess death reported at all:
Dr. Høeg then went on to discuss the Danish data specifically, and used them to try to prove that the claim made by Weinstein was not plausible.
I had previously looked at Danish mortality data in my early articles in the DS, and knew that they looked very similar to the U.K. data that I have followed throughout the Covid years. I was therefore somewhat sceptical of the idea that Denmark had little to no excess death during that time.
Following the link provided by Høeg to the Danish all-cause mortality (ACM) data for the years 2016 to 2023, the first thing you see is this chart:
It is very clear from this that there has indeed been excess death in Denmark, at least throughout 2022 and 2023, as the dark blue line trends above the light blue baseline most of the time.
Dr. Høeg then uses another chart produced by the same institute, which acknowledges this, but estimates only 6,000 excess deaths during the whole period:
As this does not meet her criteria of finding excess deaths at 0.31% of the vaccinated population, which equates to around 15,000 deaths, she claims that the Weinstein estimate must be wrong.
However the critical line to look at in her reasoning is the following one: “Now of course excess mortality depends on the baseline period you use, so estimates will differ.”
The question is, what is the baseline used in the Danish Institutes estimate of its own excess deaths? It is the wavy light blue line in the chart above, which marches steadily upwards throughout the whole period.
So, I downloaded and analysed the raw data. The expected number of annual deaths starts at 52,957 in 2016 and ends at 58,456 in 2023, a rise of 10.4%. I then checked the population data for Denmark and discovered that the figure changed from 5.728 million in 2016 to 5.911 million in 2023, a rise of 3.2%.
As Denmark has a diminishing fertility rate, in common with most of Europe, this rise is mostly through immigration, which is primarily of working age adults. The great bulk of annual mortality is always derived from the older generations, so even a gradual rise in expected deaths of 3.2% is highly improbable.
I therefore took the weekly figures for actual deaths during the four pre-Covid years of 2016-2019 and averaged them out for use as a more realistic baseline. The annual ACM death rate baseline would then be 56,232 persons. Here are the annual deaths for the four Covid years:
- 2020 58,473. Excess: 3.99%
- 2021 60,064. Excess: 6.81%
- 2022 62,262. Excess: 10.72%
- 2023 61,005. Excess: 8.49%
The average for the three vaccination years of 2021-2023 is 8.7%, which equates to 14,634 persons.
However there is one other very important factor that is missing from this analysis, and that is mortality displacement (MD). When there has been a period of excess death it should normally be followed by a period of deficit, as Andrew Bridgen recently pointed out in his address to the Westminster Hall debate on trends in excess deaths.
The older the cohort where the excess death has occurred, the faster this deficit becomes apparent in the statistics. As the average age of death due to Covid was around 80 years of age, this is obviously a cohort with relatively few years of life remaining. Crucially also, this cohort comprises about two thirds of normal expected annual mortality, so the deficit in the subsequent years will amount to about 9% of the cumulative excess deaths.
What this means in reality is that rather than pointing upwards, the light blue line in the Danish statistics ought to have been trending downwards significantly, as the cumulative excess increased over time. If you factor in the mortality displacement to the Danish figures you get the following result:
- 2020 58,473. Excess: 3.99%
- 2021 60,266. Excess: 7.17%
- 2022 62,809. Excess: 11.70%
- 2023 62,094. Excess: 10.42%
The average for the three vaccination years of 2021-2023 is 9.8%, which equates to 16,471 persons.
This level of excess mortality does meet the criteria that Dr. Høeg was searching for in the Danish data. It also poses the question of credibility for the Ioannidis analysis of the other 33 countries in his chart. If his interpretation of the Danish data can be so easily fudged so as to make deaths look ‘near normal’, then one might assume a similar process has occurred with all the others too.
The answer to the question of to what extent vaccines were involved in these excess deaths can however only be determined when record level data, linked to vaccination status, is released. The recent refusal of Steve Kirsch’s request to the ONS (aided by prompting from Andrew Bridgen) does not bode well in that regard.
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Hide the increase (or if you are a Climate tard, hide the declines). Delete the data. Eliminate the underlying records. Hide the original data. Refuse to make public any raw data sets. Calumny the inquirer. Fire off the ad hominems. Threaten with destruction and prison.
All hailed as ‘Science’ and part of our ‘vibrant democracy’ which we ‘must protect at all costs’ along with defending ‘health care’ and saving granny.
There is not a single Government, Health agency, or Health institution in the G20, that is not bought, owned, and whipped by Pharma. Not a single one. The entire medical industry is a fraud and a criminality. Including the NHS.
Can you remember when we, the ‘control group’, had to be vilified, scapegoated and othered at all costs, all because we chose to not partake in the worldwide experiment and were impervious to the military grade PsyOp? Make it make sense!
”She was vaccinated but was infected by others who chose not to be. The cost was her life.”
https://twitter.com/Fynnderella1/status/1750648365153472797
Don’t worry we will soon have all of our children put to fight other peoples children in a war designed to cover all this up and protect the old men and women politicians careers and their children.
Dennis Rancourt has now replied to Hoeg’s criticism.
https://denisrancourt.substack.com/p/my-response-to-tracy-beth-hoegs-criticisms?publication_id=1767404&post_id=141020553&isFreemail=true&r=1ninci
John Ioaniddis is someone Jay Battachyra respects immensely … I was stunned to see the Dr Hoeg article because everything I’d seen to that point indicated excess deaths were an established fact …. I am sceptical but unwilling to throw out the claim without due consideration … I’m now extremely confused to be quite frank …. hope there are more articles exploring this going forward
In Denis Rancourt’s reply to Hoeg (see GlassHalfFull above), he writes:
The Ioannidis et al. (2023) value is simply incorrect, and arises from a systematic error. They incorrectly used an average from some previous years as their baseline.
…
In fact, Denmark fits our prediction of vaccine-associated deaths.
Maybe Ioannidis will now reply to Rancourt?! But the above article confirms that Denmark’s current excess mortality is around 10%, refuting Hoeg’s statement that Denmark “had fewer deaths than expected during the pandemic period”.
It is very difficult for anyone except an honest statistician with full access to all the raw data to discover the evidence with regard to excess deaths. I read Dr Hoeg’s article with some degree of scepticism and was waiting for an analytical statistical critique such as this one. Congratulations on publishing it.
it is becoming impossible to know exactly where the truth lies, with claims and counter claims and obvious rationalisations. The high level of distrust that has been engendered by the climate of censorship, propaganda and surveillance over the pandemic years makes me suspicious of the covert vested interests that lie behind all published data.
I am beginning only to believe my own personal experience. I know that I have never witnessed so many deaths and serious health issues over the short period of time since multiple vaccine doses were given and as far as I can tell there is no other explanation that even begins to explain my observations.
As a retired doctor I would be amazed if doctors were not observing a similar uptick in probable adverse effects. They are still apparently failing to draw obvious conclusions and regularly gaslight patients with probable side effects. As individuals or a group doctors are still failing to speak up, other than to advise further boosters.
i cannot believe I am the only person feeling that we are being let down badly by those we used to trust..
My thoughts exactly. Thank you Beanie.
New Zealand’s number also look suspicious.