The hidden victims of the Trump administration’s disastrous COVID response

According to the CDC, 300,000 more Americans have died this year so far than the average expected number of deaths we should have seen in the population. Note that fully one-third of these deaths are not attributable directly to COVID. The agency estimates there have been 299,028 excess deaths in America this year through last week. 100,947 of those excess deaths have been from all causes EXCLUDING COVID-19. ETA: The agency notes that some COVID-19 deaths may be going undetected, and coded as due to something else. This is surely the case. That’s why the overall mortality increase is by far the most important metric of the mortality effects of COVID, although of course not of its many other health effects.

These data are, as the agency notes, incomplete, and the true numbers in both categories are undoubtedly higher, although how much higher will not be clear for at least a year or two (or never, if Donald Trump is re-elected, or “re-elected.”)

The total number of Americans killed indirectly by the pandemic is by itself going to be several times higher than the total number of homicides, or suicides, or drug overdose deaths, etc. in the country this year. This seems at present like a badly under-reported story, in part because we don’t know exactly why these people have died and are dying. Did they not get life-saving medical care because they avoided hospitals out of fear of the pandemic? Did they try to get care but were unable to do so because of pandemic-induced overburdening of the health care system? Are COVID-caused suicides and drug/alcohol overdoses part of the picture? What about the health effects of situational depression and social isolation?

Again, it’s going to take a long time to sort all this out, but the raw numbers are by themselves shocking, or should be, and have removed all doubt as to where exactly Donald Trump should rank among American presidents.