New CDC data: 94 percent of people who died with COVID-19 had other health issues

By Bethany Blankley | The Center Square

The overwhelming majority of reported coronavirus-related deaths – 94 percent – involved patients who had at least one other underlying health condition, such as a respiratory illness, diabetes, heart disease or another, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) says.

“COVID-19 was the only cause mentioned” for 6 percent of the coronavirus deaths reported to the CDC, according to its most recently published weekly index. Its index for the provisional coronavirus death counts are based on death certificate data received and coded by the National Center for Health Statistics as of Aug. 26, 2020.

Of the 94 percent who died with COVID-19 and other ailments, there were, on average, “2.6 additional conditions or causes per death.”

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Despite months of speculation that COVID-19 might be a highly lethal virus, the CDC this week announced that 94% of the more than 183,000 coronavirus deaths in the United States have been patients who had other significant illnesses. Just 6% of U.S. COVID-related deaths have been caused by coronavirus alone.

Several factors could have led to the deaths in the majority of those being reported as COVID-19 deaths in the U.S., which now total more than 180,000. Someone might have died in a car accident, or had a heart attack or a stroke, and also tested positive for the coronavirus, and the cause of death was marked “with COVID-19” not “by COVID-19,” but the death was included in the overall count.

In April, Texas state Sen. Donna Campbell, a board certified emergency room physician in New Braunfels, warned about the way death certificates were being handled. For someone who is riding a bike who has a heart attack, the death certificate would state cardiac arrest, not riding a bike, she explained while participating in a Texas Public Policy Foundation panel about the way the coronavirus cases were being recorded in the state. There are procedures to follow when writing death certificates, she said.

Some of the deaths included “comorbidity” factors, meaning “more than one disease or condition is present in the same person at the same time,” or “chronic or long-term conditions,” or “coexisting or co-occurring conditions.” They are also referred to as “multimorbidity” or “multiple chronic conditions.”

These conditions include influenza and pneumonia, respiratory failure, hypertensive disease, diabetes, vascular and unspecified dementia, cardiac arrest, heart failure, renal failure, intentional and unintentional injury, poisoning and other adverse events, and other medical conditions.

Dr. Angelo Codevilla, a senior fellow at the Claremont Institute, argues in The Covid Coup that the problem with coronavirus reporting extends beyond how deaths are categorized, but the hysteria caused by faulty models, which led to some shutdowns at the beginning of the pandemic.

He notes that the U.S. Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) simulated a model to predict the spread of the virus. The data it published was used as the basis for which national and state lockdowns were issued.

“Its model also predicted COVID deaths for un-locked-down Sweden,” he notes. “On May 3 it wrote that, as of May 14, Sweden would suffer up to 2,800 daily deaths. The actual number was below 40.

“Whether magnifying this falsehood was reckless or willful, it amounted to shouting ‘fire!’ in a crowded theater,” he said. “What justifies listening to, and paying, people who do that kind of science?”

After the IHME models also proved faulty for the U.S., the CDC adjusted the death rate to 0.26 percent, down from 5 percent, in May.

The CDC also adjusted how it began reporting coronavirus deaths, combining them in a new “PIC” category with pneumonia and influenza.

“That is how the death figure came to exceed 100,000,” Codevilla argues. “But if the CDC had used the same criterion that it did with the SARS virus, namely ‘severe acute respiratory distress syndrome,’ the figure by the end of June would have been some 16,000.”

Johns Hopkins University, which has been a media source for daily coronavirus updates, says “the number of confirmed coronavirus cases is nearing 6 million, and more than 183,000 people have died…”

But Johns Hopkins’ website tracker excludes comorbidity factors. It reports numbers of cases, deaths, death rate data, and positivity ratios. It also excludes recovery rates and distinctions between influenza and pneumonia.

“At different times, these experts told us that the virus posed very little danger, and that it was a mortal threat to us all, that masks were useless, and then essential,” Codevilla argues. “On the basis of their many statements, hundreds of millions of American lives were wrecked, and millions continue to languish under ‘guidelines’ that make no sense.”

Image courtesy of Public domain

6 thoughts on “New CDC data: 94 percent of people who died with COVID-19 had other health issues

  1. Up to 90% of people who test positive for Covid barely carry any virus, and are not contagious.
    Every stat about the disease is bogus.

    It appears the testing sensitivity is too high.
    A very tiny presence of the virus, completely harmless and not contagious, is classified as a CASE.
    Shutting down an entire economy is absurd.
    Isolation levels should be applied to folks with pre-existing conditions and their contacts, such as folks in nursing homes, etc.

    https://www.rt.com/op-ed/499816-positive-covid-virus-contagious/

  2. How can this be? Our own state health officer, Mr. Lavine refutes those findings as they were determined by “armchair” experts. I refer you to the lead article in today’s report.

    • How about looking around, reading some data at the state and using some common sense?
      I’m in NH, we never locked down to the degree you did in VT and we don’t have a mask mandate. A lot of people and businesses never changed a damn thing.
      I have about 1.3M people here and today, we have only 8 people in the hospital. So how bad is this then?

      It doesn’t matter how many people are sick with a flu.
      What matters is are they dying and how old are they?
      Sick people and Elderly Sick People, something IS going to take their life and this is not new.
      I see this morning that Vermont has one single person in the hospital.
      Please explain to me how on earth this is so contagious, a “Pandemic” and so deadly if only one person in the entire state is in the hospital.
      These people at some point are going to have to deal with all their fake numbers, hysteria, lies and the damage they have done because we ain’t blind or dumb out here.
      We can see with our own eyes that nothing they are saying is holding water at all, and it really never did. More people are understanding this is what the truth is.
      You’ve been scammed… you’ll see.
      A lot of us have been saying this all along.

    • Hey, Gilhooly! The position of Health Commissioner is a POLITICAL appointment, not one of expertise & experience.

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