Counting the cost: how nations tally up
A look at the death totals declared by leading nations.
United States
Official deaths: 71,526
The United States has suffered the worst death toll anywhere in the world and there are fears that varying counting protocols between states, a lag in reporting times and a shortage of tests to confirm cause of death mean the true number is much higher. Even in normal years, it can take states up to eight weeks to report full death counts to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], the US government body that collects nationwide data.
The CDC instructed states to begin recording untested but likely Covid-19 casualties in their counts in mid-April.
Britain
Official deaths: 29,427
While the number of deaths in hospitals is falling, deaths in nursing homes have not shown the same decline.
Johnson told lawmakers in the House of Commons it was too early to make international comparisons of death tolls but conceded that ‘‘there will be a time to look at what decisions we took and whether we could have taken different decisions.’’
Italy
Official deaths: 29,684
Italy, which is the worst hit country in the world after the UK and the US, counts all deaths of people who have tested positive for coronavirus in its official death toll. Istat, the national statistics agency, said on Tuesday that between February 21 and March 31, the number of deaths in Italy was up by 39 per cent compared with the average. Of those additional deaths, 13,700 were attributed to coronavirus.
That leaves 11,600 unattributed deaths.
The statistics bureau said it was likely those people either died of the virus or from other causes that were not properly treated because of the overwhelming strain on hospitals.
Spain
Official deaths: 25,613
Spain is counting all deaths of people who tested positive in its death toll.
But people who die at home or in care homes are often not tested, and figures of suspected but unconfirmed coronavirus fatalities provided by regional governments suggest the true death toll could be 15,000 to 20,000 higher.
Fernando Simon, the national coronavirus emergency response chief, acknowledged last month that the ‘‘real number of deaths is hard to know’’.
France
Official Deaths: 25,538
France has recorded the world’s fifth highest death toll from Covid-19.
Jerome Salomon, France’s director general for public health, has moved to include nursing home deaths as well as those in hospitals, and to factor in ‘‘excess mortality’’ in an attempt to get a more accurate picture of the death toll last month.
But data from the Insee statistics office now shows a nationwide increase in deaths at home, which are not currently included in the calculation because they are not tested.
China
Official deaths: 4,637
China has not clarified which cases are included in its official tally, but families have told The Daily Telegraph that relatives dying from what doctors strongly hinted was Covid-19 were never included in the count because they had not been tested.