To date, we still don’t have especially good studies on the actual causes of excess deaths by state and country when the world first went into lockdown in spring 2020.
Thus, this article reexamines data from the U.S. CDC on all-cause excess deaths by state during peak lockdown in April 2020 using the information we now know to determine what actually caused them.
This examination concludes that, contrary to popular belief, there was no uniquely deadly strain or variant emanating out of New York in spring 2020; this is clear from the fact that several states close to New York such as Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine experienced little to no excess deaths during that time period.
On the contrary, over 30,000 Americans appear to have been killed by mechanical ventilators or other forms of medical iatrogenesis throughout April 2020, primarily in the area around New York.
Weekly Excess Deaths by State in April 2020
Below are all-cause excess deaths and percentage of all-cause excess deaths per capita (“Percent Excess Estimate”) by state for each week of April 2020. All data used in this examination is obtained from “National and State Estimates of Excess Deaths,” available on the U.S. CDC website at “Excess Deaths Associated with COVID-19.”(Note: Although many of these hospitalizations and deaths may have actually occurred in March 2020, due to time lag in reporting, the vast majority were recorded in April 2020. Thus, April 2020 provides the most consistent and robust data set. After April 2020, excess deaths taper off significantly.)
The first pattern that emerges from this data is a clear correlation between population density particularly in low-income areas, cold weather, and excess deaths per capita.
For example, percent excess deaths were high in Michigan and Illinois, both of which are cold states with fairly dense and relatively poor urban centers. Percent excess deaths were likewise high in Louisiana, a warm but especially poor and dense state. Percent excess deaths were also somewhat high in Wyoming, a sparse but very cold state. By contrast, percent excess deaths were relatively low in California and Florida, both of which are somewhat dense but also warm and relatively rich states.
A clear cluster forms at the top of the chart in the area around New York City, with New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts generally experiencing the greatest percentages of excess deaths per capita for each week of April 2020. To be sure, each of these four states is a cold state with dense low-income areas, which goes a long way to account for their high excess deaths. However, outside of those four states, excess deaths per capita fall into a more normal range.
It may be tempting, therefore, to conclude that a particularly deadly strain or variant emerged around March 2020 in New York and began emanating from there, which was generally the mainstream narrative at the time.
However, the idea that a particularly deadly strain or variant began emanating from New York in March 2020 is belied by the fact that states like Vermont and New Hampshire, which are both very close to New York, had some of the lowest percentages of excess deaths of any states. Even more remarkably, Maine is very close to New York and had virtually no excess deaths to speak of throughout April 2020.
Explaining Outsized Excess Deaths in NY, NJ, CT, and MA in April 2020
If Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine belie the notion that a supervirus emanated from New York in March 2020, then what may account for the particularly high excess deaths in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts in April 2020?The answer is that the area around New York experienced a particular hysteria for the use of mechanical ventilators in spring 2020 to an extent that other states did not. Although no one has yet collected data on just how many patients were placed on mechanical ventilators in spring 2020, we can get a sense for the level of this hysteria from the hundreds of headlines advocating mechanical ventilators that sprung up around that time.
This phenomenon was not nearly as pronounced in other states. Compared to the many hundreds of results for New York and New Jersey, Google yields relatively few results for the query “Michigan mechanical ventilators 2020.” Likewise, Google yields relatively few results for “California mechanical ventilators 2020,” “Texas mechanical ventilators 2020,” or “Florida mechanical ventilators 2020,” despite the fact that each of these latter states is larger than New York by population.
How Many Were Killed by Mechanical Ventilators?
So just how many people were killed by the overuse of mechanical ventilators and other iatrogenesis in spring 2020? Unfortunately, no one has yet seriously answered that question. However, we can form a conservative estimate based on the data above by using the percentage of excess deaths in a comparable state that did not experience as much ventilator hysteria.As mentioned, outside of the New York area, Michigan also experienced a high percentage of excess deaths per capita in April 2020. Michigan is even colder than New York and New Jersey in terms of its climate, and its low-income urban centers are even more dense, both of which were primary factors correlating with excess deaths in spring 2020. Like New York and New Jersey, Michigan also had a strict lockdown at that time.
However, Michigan did not experience nearly the same level of hysteria for mechanical ventilators as did the New York area, and Michigan’s rate of excess deaths, while high, was more in line with that of other states.
Thus, we can assume that if New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts had not engaged in ventilator hysteria, then their percentages of excess deaths per capita would have been more similar to that of Michigan.
Accordingly, below, I’ve calculated the number of excess deaths that New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts would have experienced for each week if they’d had the same percentage of excess deaths as Michigan.
By subtracting the number of excess deaths that each state would have experienced if their excess death rate had been the same as that of Michigan from the number of excess deaths they actually experienced each week, we can see that in total, during April 2020, approximately 17,289 deaths in New York City, 7,347 deaths in New Jersey, 803 deaths in Massachusetts, 788 deaths in Connecticut, and 3,725 deaths in New York outside New York City were attributable to the overuse of mechanical ventilators or other iatrogenesis.
All told, this data indicates that some 30,000 patients in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts were killed by mechanical ventilators or other medical iatrogenesis in April 2020.
This is, of course, a very conservative way of estimating the number of patients killed by ventilators and iatrogenesis during this timeframe. To be sure, some unknown number of patients were put on ventilators in Michigan and other states as well. Thus, the true number of Americans killed by mechanical ventilators and other iatrogenesis in April 2020 is likely higher than 30,000.
Some 30,000 patients in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts appear to have been killed by mechanical ventilators or other medical iatrogenesis in April 2020.