{"id":148471,"date":"2022-03-23T17:10:46","date_gmt":"2022-03-23T21:10:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/?p=148471"},"modified":"2022-03-23T17:10:46","modified_gmt":"2022-03-23T21:10:46","slug":"uk-thousands-of-deaths-could-have-been-wrongly-blamed-on-covid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/antiguanewsroom.com\/uk-thousands-of-deaths-could-have-been-wrongly-blamed-on-covid\/","title":{"rendered":"UK: Thousands of deaths could have been WRONGLY blamed on COVID"},"content":{"rendered":"
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DAILY MAIL: Did official figures overestimate Britain\u2019s grim Covid death toll?<\/p>

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It\u2019s a question that has been asked persistently by medics and members of the public alike almost since the start of the pandemic.<\/p>\n

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First, disturbing stories emerged from bereaved relatives of terminally ill patients who died from the disease they\u2019d battled, only to be posthumously labelled Covid victims.<\/p>

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Then health chiefs admitted, embarrassingly, that the numbers they\u2019d been feeding the Government were only an approximation \u2013 provoking fury from Ministers.<\/p>

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More recently it was revealed that a quarter of Omicron deaths included in the daily figures did not, in fact, list Covid as a primary cause.<\/p>\n

More than two years since Covid-19 emerged, many feel they want a simple answer: how many were killed by this virus?<\/p>

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Last week, in the first of a series of special reports probing the science that has underpinned our pandemic response, The Mail on Sunday set about tackling the ongoing concerns that tests used to diagnose Covid were picking up people who were not actually infected.<\/p>\n

The conclusion of some scientists was, yes, they did. And there were those who maintained that despite shortcomings, PCR swabs \u2013 used by millions \u2013 were accurate enough.<\/p>

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Yet one study suggested that as many as a third of all positive cases may not have been infectious at the time they took the test.<\/p>

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It not only means the true scale of the pandemic could have been distorted, but also that many people may have been forced to self-isolate unnecessarily.<\/p>\n

Equally concerning is the idea that the UK\u2019s stark and terrifying death figures \u2013 which were broadcast daily \u2013 were misleading and even overblown.<\/p>\n

And today we will try to uncover the truth, or get as close as we can.<\/p>\n

Another step forward in understanding comes from new analysis from scientists at the University of Oxford and charity Collateral Global, shared exclusively with this newspaper.<\/p>\n

The group combed through 800 responses to Freedom of Information requests made by members of the public to medical institutions such as care homes and hospital trusts, and found fundamental flaws in way Covid fatalities were recorded.<\/p>\n

In total, 14 different terms were used to describe a person who had died with Covid \u2013 including \u2018underlying Covid\u2019, \u2018due to Covid\u2019, \u2018involving Covid\u2019 and \u2018died within either 28 or 60 days of a positive test\u2019.<\/p>\n

Some hospital trusts required a positive test to certify a Covid death, while others didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Most shockingly, in care homes, deaths were certified by doctors making their inspection via a video call \u2013 and this was permitted due to emergency guidance introduced in April 2020.<\/p>\n