Italy, Spain, England and Wales were the countries with the highest excess mortality between March and May 2020, during the first wave of the covid-19 pandemic, while Switzerland and Greece were the countries with the highest excess deaths in the last months of the year
The ICU of a hospital in Rome in a file photo. EFE/EPA/GIUSEPPE LAMI
This is the main conclusion of an international study that has analyzed the impact of the pandemic on the excess mortality recorded during 2020 in England, Greece, Italy, Switzerland and Spain.
The study, led by the School of Public Health at Imperial College London, and carried out by researchers from the Carlos III Health Institute (ISCIII), in collaboration with the University of Castilla-La Mancha, has been published this week in the journal «Nature Communications».
Using data from the 2015–2019 period and statistical projection models, the researchers have tried to quantify the deaths that would have occurred in these five countries if the pandemic had not happened.
The authors recall that these estimates include deaths from all causes, not just from covid-19, and that excess deaths, especially during the first wave, account for a significant part of deaths from coronavirus, but also from other related causes. with the pandemic (such as people who died of covid but were not officially diagnosed).
The study concludes that Italy, Spain, England and Wales were the countries with the highest excess deaths in the first wave, and Switzerland the one with the highest excess mortality in the last months of the year.
In Spain, the estimates for excess deaths in the pandemic have been analyzed at the ISCIII National Epidemiology Center through the Daily Mortality Monitoring System (MoMo).
According to the study, Madrid, Castilla-La Mancha and Castilla y León, and Lombardy, in Italy, were the regions with the highest excess mortality during the first year of the pandemic, around 30 percent more than expected.
During the first half of the year, northern Italy and central Spain were the most affected areas.
For their part, in England, Greece and Switzerland, the regions with the highest excess mortality were the outskirts of London and the West Midlands (England), Eastern, Western and Central Macedonia (Greece) and Ticino (Switzerland), with an excess of mortality close to 20 percent in 2020.
By sex, when comparing the number of deaths registered between 2015 and 2019 with those of 2020, the results of the investigations show that in England 40,631 men and 27,739 women died more than expected, followed by Italy, with 59,327 men and 52,206 women, from Spain, with 35,868 men and 33,208 women, from Greece, with 5,380 men and 5,909 women, and from Switzerland, with 5,788 men and 4,526 women.
Analyzed by temporal patterns, the study points out that England and Spain registered more deaths than expected in the first wave (March-May 2020), while Switzerland and Greece suffered more from excess deaths between November and December of that year.
Finally, the authors point out that commuting influenced community transmission during the early stages of the pandemic, noting that it was important to limit it in the main regions of contagion and transmission to minimize its spread to other places and countries.
