They can't be serious! And in Hiroshima, most weren't
They can't be serious! And in Hiroshima, most weren't
Yet more evidence of inflated severe case numbers
I previously looked at the confusing way in which severe Covid cases are counted in Japan.
The overall takeaway was that the numbers for Osaka and Tokyo fairly reflect reality because, unlike the national government, they count severe cases based on Covid symptoms not the type of bed occupied. But what about out in the provinces? If they count severe cases the same way as the national government, aren’t the numbers going to be inflated?
Well, Japan’s National Institute of Infectious Diseases has helped us out by analyzing data for severe and fatal cases in January in Hiroshima Prefecture (you’ve heard of the place, right?). So what did they find?
Yep, only 9 (37.5%) of 24 “severe” cases were actually severe cases! The median age was 70, and all had either pre-exisiting conditions or known risk factors for severe Covid. 4 were double jabbed, 1 single jabbed, and 4 unjabbed. None had died at the time the survey was taken.
So why were the other 15 (median age 70; all double jabbed) counted as severe? According to the report, they were placed in beds meant for severe patients either (1) as a precaution because they had risk factors for severe Covid or (2) there were no other beds available. The reason (2) is a reason is that only certain hospitals admit Covid patients, so if they run out of beds for mild/moderate patients, they’ll place mild/moderate patients in unoccupied ICUs and the like and count them as severe.
So basically, the “severe” case numbers outside of Tokyo and Osaka are more inflated than even I expected.
The report also looked at the case details for 11 deaths in medical facilities.
As you can see, none of the deceased received intensive treatment of any kind. Of these 11, the median age was 85, 8 needed full or partial assistance in activities of daily living, and 10 had known pre-existing conditions (the other was unclear).
There were also 8 deaths outside of medical facilities: median age was again 85, and 6 had known pre-exisiting conditions (the other 2 were unclear).
The report doesn’t break down the ratio of with : from Covid deaths, but frankly I’m not sure it matters. As a leaked document from the German Ministry of the Interior put it in 2020, “Coronavirus essentially kills people who would statistically have died anyway because they had reached the end of their lives and their weakened bodies could no longer bear additional everyday stress factors.”
Which goes to show the claim that the the Covid jabs were effective at preventing deaths was always going to be a false promise. And in case you were wondering about the vaccination status of these 19 deaths, 13 (68.4%) were double jabbed, 1 (5.2%) was single jabbed, 2 (10.5%) were unjabbed, and 3 (15.7%) were unclear.
But these data were from January, before the booster campaign really got going. And as we’ve seen already, booster by name, booster by nature.