Focus on preventing tragic deaths

Craig Bauld

Opinion

There are a number of figures that we should keep in our minds if we want to avoid being thrown into a panic by doomsayers. They are broad, approximate figures and I sometimes round them up or down a bit to make them easy to remember, but they are truthful.

About 60 million people die in the world each year. Two and a bit years of Covid, so about 130m deaths. Officially 6m of them from Covid, or with Covid. That 6m figure is probably a bit light, there are interesting calculations about “excess deaths” suggesting the true figure is higher. Nevertheless, officially we have about 60m deaths a year of which 3m are from Covid.

Contrast with Spanish flu, about 50m deaths at a time when the annual death rate was about 25m.

New Zealand. In a regular year we have about 35,000 deaths. Round about 100 a day. Probably 70-80 a day in summer and 120 in winter, but call it a hundred a day. So don't panic when experts talk about 20 deaths a day from Covid, they mainly come from the cohort at extreme risk of dying already.

Next interesting figure. Nobody dies of old age in NZ. It simply isn't an “official” cause of death, instead they are listed as dying from whatever organ fails first — heart, liver, lungs, cancers, whatever. Equally nobody dies of starvation, though anyone who deals with the frail-aged knows they tend to give up eating and fade away. And only 500 are listed as dying from the flu because while flu is acceptable as a cause of death, it is not a popular choice of attending physicians. Because the aged become so frail the least little infection can tip them over the edge, but most are listed under the organ that fails (typically pneumonia) rather than flu, viral infection, etc. Except Covid, of course.

Next interesting statistic. Everybody dies. We are born, we live, we die. Early and unnecessary death is often tragic. It is tragic when young kids are beaten to death within their own whanau, and we have far too much of that in NZ. It is tragic when innocent people are gunned down by lunatics. It is tragic when innocent people are smashed in motor vehicle “accidents” by drunks or kids fleeing the police. It is tragic when otherwise healthy people get cancer of an organ, or have a failure of an artery, especially if they die from it only because of the waiting times inherent in our health system. It is tragic when young people feel so bereft of hope that they see suicide as an option. It is tragic when leaders of countries become so stuffed with pride or whatever that they decide to get into armed conflict with another country.

But it is not tragic if I die. I am getting old. Something is going to kill me one of these days. Probably not the flu, even though I don't get jabbed for that either, because I am still fairly robust. And probably not Covid for the same reason. Infections basically only knock you off if you are frail and teetering on the edge, so if they can kill me I'm obviously close to my time anyway. More likely I'll do something stupid like cutting off a leg with my chainsaw.

Speaking as an old person, I want my Government to concentrate its efforts and our country's wealth on preventing tragic deaths, looking after our young, not scrabbling to keep old codgers breathing for an extra week or two.