Mapping Excess Deaths

The number of excess deaths in the last year far outweighs the number of official Covid-19 fatalities. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention between the beginning of February last year and the 9th June this year there have been up to 713,873 excess deaths. Nearly 25% of those excess deaths (up to 169,687) were not officially attributed to COVID-19. 

The large discrepancy between the number of recorded Covid-19 deaths and the actual number of excess deaths means that if want to get a truer picture of the effect of this pandemic we should be looking at where the greatest number of excess deaths has been the highest.

In COVID-19 Deaths: Who Wasn’t Counted? Capital and Main has mapped out the number of excess deaths at the county level. Capital and Main argue that these "excess death numbers suggest the pandemic’s impact on the country is likely even greater than the official statistics have shown". However even Capital and Main's excess death map could be obscuring the true picture. The huge discrepancy in the number of excess deaths recorded in counties in North Carolina compared to neighboring counties in other states suggests that the way excess deaths are recorded is different in different states (or North Carolinians have some innate immunity to Covid) .