COVID-19: Death Data in England – Update 24th April

April 24, 2020

Jason Oke, Carl Heneghan

Summary

Consistent with previous analyses, the peak day of deaths was the 8th of April. The structure of the data is similar across the regions, with the peak in London on the 4th of April, four days ahead of the rest of the country, the 8th of April.

NHS England releases data at 2 pm each day and reports daily count up to the previous day as well as a total figure. We wrote about the problems with reconciling the different data here:

Today’s reported figure is 587 deaths in hospitals in England. These deaths are distributed back to the 11th of March: There are 20.5% fewer deaths than a week ago, 17th April (n=738 deaths).

There are deaths reported for 30 different dates (n =133; 23%) that are from outside the uncertainty region of the revised upward zone. These deaths go back to the 11th of March. We do not know the reason for this.

These deaths are distributed across the following days:

and are distributed by region as follows (Today we have added on the South West)

The figure shows the reporting of deaths by NHS England underestimate those reported by ONS – One of the reasons for this is NHS England’s data does not include deaths reported outside hospitals.

Daily reports generally add more to the previous two days (up to a maximum 300 deaths), and can add back to the previous week’s counts (the grey shaded area in figure 2).

See also:

COVID-19 Death Data in England – Update 17th April

and

Tracking mortality over time

Assessment of Mortality in the Covid-19 outbreak

AUTHORS

Jason Oke is a Senior Statistician at the Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences and Module Coordinator for Statistical Computing with R and Stata (EBHC Med Stats), and Introduction to Statistics for Health Care Research (EBHC), as part of the Evidence-Based Health Care Programme.

Carl Heneghan is Professor of Evidence-Based Medicine, Director of the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine and Director of Studies for the Evidence-Based Health Care Programme. (Full bio and disclosure statement here)

Disclaimer: the article has not been peer-reviewed; it should not replace individual clinical judgement, and the sources cited should be checked. The views expressed in this commentary represent the views of the authors and not necessarily those of the host institution, the NHS, the NIHR, or the Department of Health and Social Care. The views are not a substitute for professional medical advice.