A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report released last week has quickly become yet another cause for public controversy and confusion. Why? Because the coronavirus data — which showed that 94% of people who die of COVID-19 also have preexisting conditions — has been widely misinterpreted by many (including, of course, our President).
For those who egregiously assert that COVID-19 deaths are overreported, this served as evidence that most of the people who died after being infected with coronavirus were actually already sick beforehand and that COVID-19 itself has only actually killed only around 9,000 people in the US. Here’s everything you need to know to remain on the logical side of this conversation.
The report released by the CDC was a breakdown of COVID-19 fatalities in the U.S. from February to August, based on death certificates. First of all, this data is considered “provisional,” because these counts may not match counts from other sources, such as data from county health departments, the CDC stated in the report. That doesn’t mean the information is irrelevant, it just means that it’s subject to change. The CDC considers death certificates to be reliable sources of information because they include demographic details that state reporting agencies don’t, which makes them useful in figuring out what other factors (e.g.: like age, race, and underlying health conditions) may have contributed to a person’s death. Continue reading.