Massive Under-counting of Covid-19 Deaths in New York

Since coronavirus began scything through Europe, substantial anecdotal information suggested that the actual number of fatalities caused by Covid-19 was being understated.  The primary reason for the under counting of deaths was the number of victims who died outside of hospitals.  Seldom were these individuals subjected to any testing for the presence of the virus and their deaths were not attributed to the virus.  However, the number of home deaths was substantially greater in March than the normal rate of home fatalities.  

It' not just in Europe that these home deaths have been excluded from the coronavirus death totals.  Reporting out of New York suggests that it is possible that almost as many New Yorkers are dying outside of hospitals due to Covid-19 as are dying in hospitals.

As of Monday afternoon, 2,738 New York City residents have died from ‘confirmed’ cases of COVID-19, according to the city Department of Health. That’s an average of 245 a day since the previous Monday.

But another 200 city residents are now dying at home each day, compared to 20 to 25 such deaths before the pandemic, said Aja Worthy-Davis, a spokeswoman for the medical examiner’s office. And an untold number of them are unconfirmed.

The FDNY says it responded to 2,192 cases of deaths at home between March 20th and April 5th, or about 130 a day, an almost 400 percent increase from the same time period last year. (In 2019, there were just 453 cardiac arrest calls where a patient died, according to the FDNY.)

That number has been steadily increasing since March 30th, with 241 New Yorkers dying at home Sunday — more than the number of confirmed COVID-19 deaths that occurred citywide that day. On Monday night, the city reported 266 new deaths, suggesting the possibility of a 40% undercount of coronavirus-related deaths.