Thread by @drjenndowd

1/ 👇What is the real #COVID19 death toll in England & Wales? In our new study led by @jm_aburto & @ridhikash07, we estimate 53,937 excess deaths in the first half of 2020, roughly 33% higher than officially reported COVID-19 deaths. bit.ly/30koOrx

2/ Excess deaths vary by age & sex, with males comprising 54% of excess deaths in despite being a smaller proportion of the population at the oldest ages (so males have a higher risk of dying at all ages).

3/ The largest numbers of lives lost were among the 75-85 & 85+ groups, reflecting mortality 29.1% & 36.8% above expected levels. 15-44 year olds accounted for only 290 excess deaths, 6.1% above the expected level.

4/ Using data from the first 26 weeks of 2020 we estimate a reduction in life expectancy of 1.7 year for females and 1.9 years for males.

5/ Baseline # of deaths w/o COVID-19 estimated by fitting a Generalized Additive Model assuming a Poisson distribution of deaths. The model includes smooth effects for the long term trend, age & seasonality, and an interaction between age & seasonality. #poptwitter @PopulationEU

6/ Thanks to all the amazing work by @jburnmurdoch @HMDatabase & others getting important excess mortality visualizations out there during this fire-hose of pandemic data #infodemic

7/ This huge burden of excess mortality over a short period of time is sobering, underscoring the need for continued non pharmaceutical interventions to prevent a resurgence in England & Wales that reduces LE even further. @uksciencechief @CMO_England @10DowningStreet

8/ Finally great as always to work with an amazing team @OxfordDemSci: @jm_aburto @jschoeley @ridhikash07 @VictimOfMaths @melindacmills @NuffieldLibrary @SociologyOxford @CPop_SDU @oxsocsci @PopAssocAmerica