Statistics released this morning by the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (home to the General Register Office) reveal that up until 10 April, there were 157 COVID-19-related deaths in Northern Ireland. Information provided on death certificates allows them to break down the place of death:
- 109 people died in hospital (69%)
- 41 people died in care homes and hospices (26%) across 23 separate establishments
- 7 people died at residential addresses (4%)
The most comparable ‘daily’ figure from the PHA surveillance reports which are announced each day (and sometimes updated as further information is made available) suggests that there were 118 deaths of people with a positive COVID-19 test up to 10 April, covering deaths in hospital plus some notified from care homes or hospices where the patient had had a positive test. The PHA figures include anyone with a positive test, whether or not COVID-19 is the cause of death.
The new figures reveal that there were 39 – a third – additional deaths that weren’t detectable by the daily PHA reporting, ie, people who hadn’t been formally tested.
One caveat to note is that these new figures include any mention of COVID-19 in the free-form text of the death certificate, whether it was the primary underlying cause of death or not.
The devil is in the detail of statistics.
- PHA’s daily figure of people who died in the previous 24 hour measurement period (up to 5pm the day before) and had tested positive is the most contemporary figure and comparable with other regions of the UK and internationally.
- The new weekly figure from NISRA based on date of death has been developed to allow backward comparison with PHA’s daily one.
- To compare the total numbers of deaths related to COVID-19, the most stable metric to use is NISRA’s weekly provisional death statistic which is based on the date of registration of the death (rather than the date of death) and is less likely to have to be corrected due to late information. [CORRECTION] That statistic reports that 76 (17.5%) out of a total of 435 deaths registered in Northern Ireland in the week ending 10 April mentioned COVID-19 on their death certificate.
Earlier this week, FactCheckNI published an explainer article about the difference in the statistics across the UK.
Alan Meban. Tweets as @alaninbelfast. Blogs about cinema and theatre over at Alan in Belfast. A freelancer who writes about, reports from, live-tweets and live-streams civic, academic and political events and conferences. He delivers social media training/coaching; produces podcasts and radio programmes; is a FactCheckNI director; a member of Ofcom’s Advisory Committee for Northern Ireland; and a member of the Corrymeela Community.
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