The source you cited is https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ which isn't reporting excess mortality, that site reports data from PHE and other regional bodies. As you know, those values are wrong, which is why they're now labelled as "COVID associated deaths", a label which speaks to the meaninglessness of the values.
Excess deaths is an entirely different statistic. We can assume total mortality is correct, but that says nothing about what causes it. For example, many excess deaths are clearly not caused by COVID because COVID isn't mentioned on the death certificate, but rather some other problem, even with the ultra-lax reporting and suddenly changed death certificate standards that the UK has introduced.
In reality lock down has caused some deaths. The virus has caused some - or slightly accelerated some, it's not really clear how much life-years reduction has really taken place given the absolutely on-average mortality profile.
I'm very sorry to hear about your friends, but bear in mind "epic shits" aren't even a recognised symptom of COVID. It's a respiratory disease. There's a lot of conflation going on where people are reporting things that aren't COVID as if it was some new but hitherto unknown side effect of the virus. In reality, other kinds of illness didn't stop because a new virus turned up and people can still get sick with the flu or many other diseases - as they do every year - even though COVID is more well known by this point.
And thats just two, there are many more. Bear in mind they were _all_ covid positive. It wasn't someone saying "I had the snuffles". Lab confirmed covid cases. They are also medical, either nurses or doctors.
> In reality lock down has caused some deaths. The virus has caused some - or slightly accelerated some, it's not really clear how much life-years reduction has really taken place given the absolutely on-average mortality profile.
excess mortality in april was ~880(with smoothing) people a day. but sure, its all just a conspiracy.
Given that the normal causes of excess death have been significantly truncated: driving, drinking and sports, its fairly reasonable to assume that standard causes of death have dropped. We can expect significant spike in deaths from chronic conditions such as cancer, diabetes and copd, but that takes time.
> ultra-lax reporting and suddenly changed death certificate standards that the UK has introduced.
actually its been tightened up, and been told to be more specific. Normally an old person dying in a home is put down to "old age", or, if they fall down the stairs: "terminal event" (falls are a massive killer) before you start talking about attending doctors, none of that happens in practice. Its whoever needs the ash cash that certifies the death.(it depends on the consultant. I know of one who managed to buy a porche with the ash cash. Although I think the payments have stopped now) Or if its outside hospital, who ever answers the phone.
Look, I'm never going to change your mind, but just look at those stats. Something caused a huge spike. That spike started dropping before lockdown ended. That looks like a standard epidemic curve to me. I don't see how it can be reasonably read differently
Given that the normal causes of excess death have been significantly truncated: driving, drinking and sports, its fairly reasonable to assume that standard causes of death have dropped
Gosh, where did you get this idea from? Is this a new talking point from somewhere?
Taking the UK again as an example, road deaths are rare and stable at about 1700 per year or about 32 per week:
Overall weekly deaths are 10,000 or so (outside of spike times). Even if the roads became totally empty tomorrow you wouldn't be able to see the difference, it'd be lost in the noise. And obviously lockdown doesn't lead to empty roads: people must still drive to deliver goods, engage in urgent business and so on, so reduction in weekly deaths due to less driving would in reality be less than 32.
As for drink - do you really think people drink less when locked up on their own for months on end? They don't, they drink far more:
Finally, deaths due to sport?! In an average year in the UK between 15-25 people "die accidentally in athletic/sporting areas" according to the ONS. Deaths due to sport aren't relevant on the scales we're talking about.
Look, I'm never going to change your mind, but just look at those stats. Something caused a huge spike
I am looking at the stats. That's why I consider COVID to be mass hysteria.
Yes, there's a spike in some countries. It's not in any way describable as huge. UK spike matches the famous plague years of 1998/1999/2000. I don't remember any particular special disease in those years:
Yet according to the official stats 10,000 people died of COVID. Clearly this claim can't be true. Where are all these excess deaths?
What's happening here is a highly infectious but virtually harmless virus has been labelling an ever increasing segment of the population as COVID positive. A tiny number of these people really do get hurt by the virus, but that's not important in the grand scheme of things: apparently even the common cold can kill 8% of the elderly. With basically any virus, and especially flu, you can get alarming stories of battles with death by people who were apparently healthy - just search for them and you'll find them. It doesn't by itself mean the virus is dangerous, which is always a relative term.
What happens if you randomly label a huge and ever-increasing section of the population, then measure their health? You get "COVID associated deaths" (which means nothing, it's just a statistical artifact) and you get an ever-widening array of "associated symptoms", because you're measuring normal health activity but re-assigning the cause. So I admit defeat on the "epic shits" point - I should know by now not to say COVID is a respiratory disease and thus can't cause $RANDOM_SYMPTOM, because public health has lost its mind and is publishing papers on random correlations all over the place. The fact that correlation doesn't imply causation has been totally lost.
How can you convert a not very dangerous virus into an excess death spike? Well, it'd cause a small spike by itself anyway, but if you want to make it bigger doing things that increase the spread of every virus sounds good to me: things like flushing all the sick people out of hospitals into care homes, creating panic in said care homes that leads to abandonment (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52014023), locking people indoors where they're coughing all over each other, putting people into depressions etc.
Excess deaths is an entirely different statistic. We can assume total mortality is correct, but that says nothing about what causes it. For example, many excess deaths are clearly not caused by COVID because COVID isn't mentioned on the death certificate, but rather some other problem, even with the ultra-lax reporting and suddenly changed death certificate standards that the UK has introduced.
In reality lock down has caused some deaths. The virus has caused some - or slightly accelerated some, it's not really clear how much life-years reduction has really taken place given the absolutely on-average mortality profile.
I'm very sorry to hear about your friends, but bear in mind "epic shits" aren't even a recognised symptom of COVID. It's a respiratory disease. There's a lot of conflation going on where people are reporting things that aren't COVID as if it was some new but hitherto unknown side effect of the virus. In reality, other kinds of illness didn't stop because a new virus turned up and people can still get sick with the flu or many other diseases - as they do every year - even though COVID is more well known by this point.