U.S. passes 1M coronavirus cases
Virus fatalities topped 24,000 nine days ago
LONDON • Britain is on track to record one of the worst coronavirus death tolls in Europe, after data published on Tuesday showed nationwide fatalities topped 24,000 nine days ago.
A day after Prime Minister Boris Johnson spoke of success in dealing with the outbreak, the new figures showed the week ending April 17 was Britain’s deadliest since comparable records began in 1993.
The Office for National Statistics said 21,284 people had died in England by April 17 with mentions of COVID-19 on their death certificate. Together with figures from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, the total United Kingdom death toll was at least 24,000 as of April 19.
“The United Kingdom is going to be right up there among the worst-hit nations in the initial surge,” said Bill Hanage, associate professor of epidemiology at Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Unlike the hospital death tolls announced daily by the government, Tuesday’s ONS figures include deaths in community settings, such as care homes where overall fatalities have trebled in a few weeks.
Health Secretary Matt Hancock said daily figures for deaths in the community would be published from Wednesday.
“It is plausible that there are now as many Covidlabelled deaths occurring out of hospital as there are in hospitals in England,” said David Spiegelhalter, professor of the public understanding of risk at the University of Cambridge.
Overall, Tuesday’s figures for COVID-19 deaths in England and Wales up to April 17 were more than 50 per cent higher than the daily toll for deaths in hospitals initially announced by the government.
The figures underline the scale of the challenge facing Johnson as he returns to work after recovering from COVID-19 and the dangers of relaxing Britain’s lockdown too soon.
He warned on Monday that it was still too dangerous to relax stringent measures wreaking havoc on the economy, for fear of a deadly second outbreak.
The ONS bases its figures on mentions of COVID-19 in death certificates, including suspected cases rather than those who actually tested positive.
A U.K. death toll of more than 24,000 puts it among the worst-hit in Europe, exceeding France — which also counts deaths in care homes — by around 5,000 at that point in time.
Britain’s true toll is likely to be closer to Spain or even Italy, Europe’s worst-affected countries, although their reporting of deaths outside hospital is patchy so exact comparisons are difficult.
The latest daily figures released by Britain’s health ministry for COVID-19 deaths in hospitals hit 21,678.