In recent weeks, we’ve been keeping an eye on weekly total deaths as they are reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Weekly deaths—as opposed to COVID-19 death totals—provide some needed context. This is important, since we now know doctors and health administrators are encouraged to be—in the words of Deborah Birx—”liberal” with counting COVID-19 deaths.
This week I’m looking at week 14 (the week ending April 4) deaths for a second time as we wait for some more complete counting for week 15.
The week 14 data, which is now three weeks old, shows that nationwide total deaths were up by 4,512 over the 2017–19 average for week 14. In other words, “excess deaths” in week 14 now total about 0.0013 percent of the US population.
We also know that most of this is coming from the state of New York. New York now reports 3,373 total deaths for week 14. This means that for the week the death total was up by 1,385 over the 2017–19 average of 1,987.
This isn’t surprising, since, as we see here, COVID-19 deaths in New York are many times larger per capita than is the case in the rest of the nation. Indeed, New York and New Jersey combined account for more COVID-19 deaths than all other US states combined.
