Confirmed COVID-19 associated deaths are defined as people who have died with a laboratory-confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Confirmed COVID-19 associated death

Probable COVID-19 associated deaths are defined as individuals with COVID-19 or SARS-CoV-2 written on their death certificate as an immediate, underlying, or contributing cause of death, but are missing a laboratory-confirmed report of SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Probable COVID-19 associated death

All-cause excess deaths are defined as the number of deaths that exceed seasonal expected levels. This metric is often used to assess severity of pandemics in a given community. Unlike the count of confirmed and probable COVID-19 associated deaths, this measure might include deaths of individuals who were not tested, false negatives, those who died outside of hospitals, and cases where patients were not suspected to have SARS-CoV-2 infection. Failure to address excess death is likely to result in underestimation of the impact of COVID-19.

Excess Death

When identifying COVID-19 associated deaths, it's important to understand what methods are being used to compile the fatality statistics. It is possible to underestimate the severity of the pandemic if deaths aren't appropriately accounted for.
- Confirmed COVID-19 associated death
- Probable COVID-19 associated death
- Excess death

University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

Due to differences in testing and case definitions, as well as how new COVID-19 is, the fatality of the virus is not well-defined yet.

Fatality of COVID-19

On July 27, 2020, the number of confirmed cases was 16,523,815
 worldwide, with 655,112 deaths resulting in a crude fatality rate of 4.0%..

Case Fatality Rate of COVID-19

The sum of all stages of the product of the probability of dying from the disease at a given stage and the probability of surviving to that stage. The case fatality risk proportion of COVID-19 is less often used than case fatality rate and is still being determined with ongoing research.

Case Fatality Risk Proportion of COVID-19

Fatality of COVID-19 by Continent

Types of COVID-19 Associated Deaths

African American/black individuals had a much higher mortality rate (73 COVID-19 cases per 100 000 individuals) compared to Latino individuals (36 COVID-19 cases per 100000 individuals) and White individuals (22 COVID-19 cases per 100000 individuals).

COVID-19 Mortality Differences by Race, United States

As of May 7, 2020 in New York City, NY,  there was greater age-adjusted COVID-19 mortality rates of Latino individuals (187 per 100 000) and African American individuals (184 per 100 000), than of White (93 per 100 000) individuals. 

COVID-19 Mortality Differences by Race, NYC, United States

Studies of COVID-19 Patient Mortality Categorized by Geographic Region 

IFR stands for infection mortality rate and it represents the proportion of infected people who will die (including those who don't get tested/don't show symptoms). It is one of the most important statistics when studying disease. The current best estimate of COVID-19 is 0.5-1%.

IFR of COVID-19

- Breastfeeding Medicine
- Bulletin Of Mathematical Biology
- Intensive Care Medicine 
- Journal of Risk Research
- Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA)
- MedRxIV
- New journal
- Resuscitation
- Social Science Research Network (SSRN)
- The Lancet
- The New England Journal of Medicine

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