Deaths counted as COVID-19 deaths despite underlying health conditions

The federal government is classifying any patient who tests positive and passes away as a COVID-19 death, despite any other present health issues.

In Tuesday’s COVID-19 briefing, Dr. Deborah Birx was asked by a reporter concerning deaths being misreported for coronavirus because of either testing or standards for how they’re characterized.

“So, I think, in this country, we’ve taken a very liberal approach to mortality, and I think the reporting here has been pretty straightforward over the last five to six weeks.”

“There are other countries that if you had a pre-existing condition and let’s say the virus caused you to go to the ICU and then have a heart or kidney problem — some countries are recording that as a heart issue or a kidney issue and not a COVID-19 death.”

“Right now, we’re still recording it, and we’ll — I mean, the great thing about having forms that come in and a form that has the ability to mark it as COVID-19 infection — the intent is, right now, that those — if someone dies with COVID-19, we are counting that as a COVID-19 death.”

A followup question was asked of Birx concerning the data possibly being skewed because of this.

“Well, I think that would apply more to rural areas that may not have the same level of testing. But I — I am pretty confident in New York City and in New Jersey and places that have these large outbreaks and COVID-only hospitals, I can tell you they are testing. New York and New Jersey together have — by proportion, are testing extraordinary well — as Washington State and Louisiana. So, I don’t see that there’s been a barrier in testing to diagnosis.”

According to the CDC, as of April 8th, the total amount of cases in the country is 395,011 with 12,754 dead.