Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 150
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 151
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Warning (512): Unable to emit headers. Headers sent in file=/home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php line=853 [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 48]
Warning (2): Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php:853) [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 148]
Warning (2): Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php:853) [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 181]
LATEST NEWS UPDATES | The scale of Gujarat’s mortality crisis -Aashish Gupta & Murad Banaji

The scale of Gujarat’s mortality crisis -Aashish Gupta & Murad Banaji

Share this article Share this article
published Published on May 25, 2021   modified Modified on May 25, 2021

-The Hindu

Analysis of excess deaths from the civil registration system spotlights the systematic obfuscation in official statements

By all accounts, the mortality impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has been exceptionally large. Crematoria, burial grounds, and, in some places, even riverbeds are full. Tragically, almost everyone has lost at least one person close to them. Given this reality, few people have much faith in official COVID-19 death counts. How many COVID-19 deaths are going uncounted? Could indirect effects of the pandemic, for example through economic distress and disruptions to health care, be contributing to a surge in mortality?

Registration data insights

These key questions, being asked for over a year, are even more pertinent now. In Gujarat, reports of overburdened crematoria and lengthy lists of obituaries indicate a severe crisis. Mortality figures from the civil registration system in Gujarat, reported recently by the Gujarati newspaper, Divya Bhaskar (https://bit.ly/3oNDnjw), provide some insight into the scale of the mortality crisis.

To provide some context, official COVID death-counts largely reflect deaths in hospitals, of patients with confirmed COVID-19, where COVID-19 is listed as a cause of death. Deaths where doctors do not write COVID-19 as a cause of death on the hospital death certificate are missed. Additionally, government “death audit committees” may choose to omit deaths of patients with confirmed COVID-19 from official tolls, citing co-morbidities as the main cause of death. Finally, deaths at home, whether of those who were tested or not, and whether test results were positive or not, are largely missed by the system.

In contrast, India’s civil registration system is supposed to register all deaths — COVID or not, at home or in a hospital. Civil registration has been improving, and across India about 86% of all deaths were registered in 2018. In Gujarat, civil registration is considered to be complete by the Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India (https://bit.ly/3wt1Ahx).

Divya Bhaskar reported that during a 71-day period between March 1, 2021 and May 10, 2021, there were 1.23 lakh deaths registered in Gujarat. In the corresponding period in 2020, there were around 58,000 registered deaths. This suggests a large increase in mortality in 2021.

Please click here to read more.


The Hindu, 25 May, 2021, https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/the-scale-of-gujarats-mortality-crisis/article34636681.ece?homepage=true


Related Articles

 

Write Comments

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

Video Archives

Archives

share on Facebook
Twitter
RSS
Feedback
Read Later

Contact Form

Please enter security code
      Close