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Comment by _yoqn | Hacker News Reader

I don't think that's actually true. If the reported numbers are correct, the number of deaths in the US was around 250k when the vaccine became available and now it's 700k. That's 450k more after the vaccine despite being widely available for a bit over a year.

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There's also a lot of gymnastics involved in order to count all these covid deaths, and a constant withholding of actual absolute death counts.

Most serious illnesses will compromise the immune system. A compromised immune system will make you more vulnerable to any infection. So the most common and most spread infection will then also naturally be the most common one to trigger death.

If someone has aids, which is a decease that compromises the immune system, and then dies from pneumonia. Did they die from pneumonia or aids?

Yes, the assigned cause question a problem. And add to that the concept of "excess" deaths being a more telling figure than the causality number. So looking at a model of past deaths you can predict future deaths (roughly) and so assume the excess to that prediction is caused by COVID-19. The problem with that is researchers are saying that up to a third of those deaths could be being caused by health care displacement, not the virus directly. i.e. a trauma patient can't make it into the ICU because it's full of COVID patients.

The statistics are a total mess in my opinion and any being professed with any exactitude should be taken with a grain of salt.

The math is fuzzy since there were several months where even though the vaccine was technically available, you couldn’t just go get it at will. It’s unavoidable, though, that the deaths after will be higher than deaths before the vaccines were available, because one of those is an unbounded range.

A year ago today on MLK day it was only available to those 75 and older. The vaccine in the US has not been available to the general public for a year! Healthcare providers yes, general public no.

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