Tag Archives: COVID-19

Vaccination and the COVID Delta variant

Posted on June 30, 2021 by colinmathers

The COVID Delta variant (B.1.617.2), which started spreading widely in India last October, is highly transmissible and might cause more severe illness and hence death. It has spread to many countries and is now the dominant strain in the UK. … Continue reading →

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Excess mortality in the USA and its causes 2000 – 2020

Posted on May 14, 2021 by colinmathers

Sam Preston and Yana Vierboom published a short paper in April which showed that Americans die at higher rates than Europeans and this translated into roughly 400,000 additional deaths in 2017 that would not have occurred if the USA had … Continue reading →

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New estimates of total global COVID-19 deaths from IHME

Posted on May 10, 2021 by colinmathers

A few days ago, the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) released estimates of total COVID-19 deaths for countries based on comparisons of total deaths from all causes during the pandemic period with the expected total deaths based on … Continue reading →

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Switzerland: COVID-19 situation and vaccine rollout

Posted on April 14, 2021 by colinmathers

Switzerland has fully vaccinated 8% of the population, somewhat ahead of France and Germany and some other EU countries (see first figure). For some reason, the percent of people who have received at least one vaccine is no higher than … Continue reading →

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What are the risks of the AstraZeneca vaccine?

Posted on April 11, 2021 by colinmathers

Currently, several EU countries are suspending use of the AstraZeneca vaccine, or recommending it not be used in various younger age groups, due to reports of blood clot risks. Australia has decided to delay rollout of vaccination for younger adults … Continue reading →

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A Covid Performance Index for countries

Posted on January 29, 2021 by colinmathers

An Australian think-tank, the Lowy Institute has produced a Covid Performance Index and used it to examine the impact of geography, political systems, economic development and population size on the Covid-19 outcomes around the world. The COVID Performance Index compiled … Continue reading →

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Are the Lancet authorship criteria adequate?

Posted on September 27, 2020 by colinmathers

In May, the Lancet published a peer-reviewed study claiming to analyse data from nearly 15,000 patients who had received the drug hydroxychloroquine for treatment of Covid-19. The study concluded that patients who received the drug were dying at a higher … Continue reading →

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The second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic

Posted on August 28, 2020 by colinmathers

Today, I took another look at the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic using data on confirmed cases downloaded from the Johns Hopkins University CCSE data repository. This post focuses mostly on western European countries, with a few others like … Continue reading →

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An update on coronavirus in Geneva and Victoria

Posted on August 5, 2020 by colinmathers

Switzerland currently bans entry from countries with more than 60 new infections per 100,000 population in the last 14 days. Geneva passed that threshold on 27th July, and passed 100 new cases per 100,000 on 1 August. So if Geneva … Continue reading →

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Covid-19: which countries are succeeding and not succeeding?

Posted on July 7, 2020 by colinmathers

There is now sufficient data on social distancing, lockdown, and other measures that researchers are starting to assess the effectiveness of these measures. The July 4th edition of The Economist has an article summarizing what is becoming clear.  Extensive testing … Continue reading →

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