Thread by @DrEricDing

FLORIDA UNDERCOUNTING COVID DEATHS—new study says 4,924 excess deaths should have been counted as resulting from #COVID19. Deaths were determined by Florida Governor directly-appointed medical examiners, which have “been subject to political pressures”. 🧵
news.yahoo.com/florida-covid-…

2) “The impact of the pandemic in Florida “is significantly greater than the official COVID-19 data suggest,” the researchers wrote.

3) “They came to that conclusion by comparing the number of estimated deaths for a six-month period in 2020, from March to September, to the actual number of deaths that occurred, a figure known as “excess deaths” because they exceed the estimate.”

4) “The lack of testing early in the pandemic may also have undercounted COVID-19 deaths, explains Daniel Weinberger, an epidemiologist at the Yale School of Public Health who has also studied the coronavirus and excess deaths.

5) “The issue was further complicated because each state has its own death-counting methodology.

6) “ “Some states classify a death as due to COVID if a positive molecular test was obtained, while other states allow the death to be classified as due to COVID if there is a suspicion that it was caused by COVID (even without a molecular test),” Weinberger wrote to Yahoo News.

7) “In the case of Florida, the researchers say, 4,924 excess deaths should have been counted as resulting from COVID-19 but for the most part were ruled as having been caused by something else, thus lowering Florida’s coronavirus fatality count.

8) “That’s possible because people who die from COVID-19 often have comorbidities, such as diabetes and asthma. That leaves some discretion for medical examiners, who have sometimes struggled with conflicting science and been subject to political pressures during the pandemic.

9) “In Florida, 25 district medical examiners are directly appointed by the governor... DeSantis was accused of trying to keep those medical examiners from releasing complete coronavirus data. (In August, COVID deaths no longer required certification from a medical examiner.)

10) I agree, we need more transparency, and better leadership

https://twitter.com/nikkifried/status/1376936605714366466

11) Naturally, FL also has one of the highest #B117 prevalence and also the most number of introductions of B117 of all states modeled.

https://twitter.com/drericding/status/1376960768302800897

12) ““I am sure that COVID-19 is responsible for most of these excess deaths,” says Moosa Tatar, a public health economist at the University of Utah who led the research team looking at Florida’s excess deaths.

13) Florida should take some lessons from Chile. Both have more vaccines but reopening too quickly can lead to another surge. And is Florida cases rising again? I won’t bother showing the graph, but of course it is.

Read this warning thread 🧵

https://twitter.com/drericding/status/1377029757578149892