Thread by @Rukmini

Thread: Today I am reporting official all-cause mortality from the state of Madhya Pradesh - with 84.5 million people, it is India’s 5th most populous state. It was also India’s fifth poorest state as of 2020. It is predominantly rural, with just 29% of its population in cities.

I wrote this for @DainikBhaskar and here's the headline: MP saw twice its usual (2018-19 average) deaths in April 2021, and *five times* the usual in May 2021

I wrote about it for @scroll_in here: scroll.in/article/996772…
This chart is all-cause mortality (Civil Registration Data) for every month since January 2018, and you don't need me to point out that May 2021 was record-breaking, and horrifying

Officially, Madhya Pradesh reported just 4,461 Covid deaths between January 1 and May 31 2021. The excess deaths seen in the same period are over 42 times the reported Covid death toll, though the entire excess death toll is not attributable to Covid.

The increase is in Bhopal and Indore yes, but also in smaller cities and rural districts

Some quick takeaways (more detailed to follow later):
1. We shouldn't assume that excess mortality in less developed states will be at the relatively modest scale of that in big cities (Chennai, Kolkata, Mumbai)

2. The second wave struck hard (seen this in Chennai and MP now) so we shouldn't keep relying on some 2020 data that we have to assume that there wasn't a covid-related surge in deaths

3. The scale of under-reporting suggested from cities like Mumbai and Chennai was modest. But with the caveat that all excess deaths are not from covid, the excess mortality in Apr-May 2021 in MP was *42* times the official covid death toll.

4 and last. Keep pushing for more data from all states, friends!
cc @muradbanaji @jburnmurdoch @ArielKarlinsky