COVID-19 accounts for 10% of excess mortality

There were 4,000 more deaths than expected in Australia during the first two months of 2022, according to the latest modelling from the Actuaries Institute, equating to an excess mortality of 15% above pre-pandemic levels and revising previous excess mortality estimates upwards by 50%.

COVID-19 alone accounted for 2,500 deaths (10% excess mortality) while other causes of death accounted for 1,500 excess deaths, including ischaemic heart disease (220 more deaths than expected), diabetes (130 more), and dementia (370 more).

The Institute modelling measures actual deaths against predicted deaths, adjusted as the population ages and grows, and allowing for trends in mortality improvement.

“These adjustments are important because a simple comparison with historical averages can be misleading,” said Jennifer Lang, spokesperson for the Australian Actuaries Institute’s COVID-19 mortality working group.

Using daily reported COVID-19 deaths for March to May, the Institute estimates that May deaths will be much higher than those in March and April – almost at the levels seen in January and February.

In the last three months, there were 3,054 COVID-19 deaths. Adjusting the figures to reflect the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ latest data on deaths ‘with’ rather than ‘from’ COVID-19, the Institute estimates that around 2,500 of these deaths were due to COVID-19. This will result in excess COVID-19 mortality of around 6%.

Total excess mortality is still expected to be higher once detailed data is available.

“We conservatively estimate Australia’s excess deaths cumulatively across the pandemic to be at least 5,500 by the end of May 2022,” Lang said.