Via The Guardian: St Petersburg death tally casts doubt on Russian coronavirus figures. Excerpt:
New mortality data from Russia’s second-largest city has reignited questions about whether the country’s official tally has discounted thousands of deaths tied to the coronavirus outbreak.
St Petersburg issued 1,552 more death certificates this May than in the previous year, a nearly 32% rise indicating that hundreds of deaths tied to the pandemic are not reflected in the city’s official coronavirus death toll for the month of 171.
It is not clear how many of those people had tested positive for coronavirus or were suspected to have been infected. But statisticians and doctors have previously told the Guardian that 75% or higher of “excess deaths”, the number of deaths exceeding what would regularly be expected, are likely to be tied to the coronavirus outbreak. That means potentially 1,000 additional deaths in St Petersburg in May tied to the pandemic.
The new data, released by the city on Wednesday and first reported by Reuters, further indicates how Russia’s conservative account of its coronavirus death toll may be missing out thousands of deaths, while feeding political talking points and informing policy decisions about tackling the outbreak and reopening the country.
Russia has reported a 1.2% mortality rate from the disease, while Brazil and the US have reported higher than 5.6% and 5.8%, respectively, according to Johns Hopkins University. France posted a 15.4% mortality rate and Italy has posted a 14.4% mortality rate. But experts have said that comparing national mortality rates is misleading when reporting standards vary widely and that excess deaths are likely to give a clearer picture of the death toll from the disease.
Russian officials have aggressively denied that the data on coronavirus deaths is being massaged. Even if corrected upward to reflect likely deaths from coronavirus, the death toll in cities such as St Petersburg or Moscow will probably remain far lower than in cities such as New York and London.
Still, data posted in recent weeks by St Petersburg, Moscow and in regions such as Dagestan, has caused scandals, showing that deaths from pneumonia likely tied to the outbreak could be far higher than the official coronavirus death toll, sometimes by a factor of 10. In many other regions, data on total mortality for May and April remains unavailable, making it difficult to corroborate the government’s official tally of deaths from coronavirus.
