This one chart showing mortality risk will blow your mind

You know how some people like to downplay this whole pandemic situation by pointing out that most of the people who die are old and/or sick? You know, people like this:

“Every story that does not mention, preferably at the top, the vast over-representation of nursing home deaths in the coronavirus death count...is a story that is deliberately concealing the truth.” - Heather Mac Donald

This, of course, ignores the fact that there is a lot more to the pandemic than just death. There is also:

1. The fact that when people get sick they cannot work and that often the need to quarantine/disinfect causes further disruptions and economic harm.

2. The fact that many people who do not die are hospitalized, taking away hospital beds from others who might need them and potentially exposing doctors and nurses to a virus that could affect their ability to continue to do their jobs.

3. The fact that there is growing evidence that there are lasting effects for those who recover.

But, let's set that aside for a moment. It is absolutely true that most of the people who die from COVID are elderly. Don't believe me? Well, here is a histogram (a type of bar chart) showing the number of deaths by age group. The taller the bar, the more deaths that occur among people of that age range.

Now you may have noticed that I showed not one graph but two and that I left off the labels along the y-axis. That is because I have a couple of challenges for you.

One of the bar charts is a bar chart of the number of deaths due to COVID-19 by age in the US, but which? The other is ... something else.

Challenge #1: Can you guess which bar chart represents the number of deaths due to COVID?

Challenge #2: Can you guess what the other bar chart represents?

I will give you a minute to think, and in the mean time. Here is an xkcd comic to amuse you (and prevent you from accidentally seeing the answer). It also happens to be a surprisingly accurate description of my life right now.

Ok, time is up. Here are the answers:

Solution to challenge #1: The first bar chart is the one with the breakdown of COVID deaths by age in the US (https://data.cdc.gov/NCHS/Provisional-COVID-19-Death-Counts-by-Sex-Age-and-S/9bhg-hcku/data). Notice that most deaths occur among the elderly, just as Heather Mac Donald so helpfully pointed out.

Solution to challenge #2: The second bar chart is the average number of deaths caused by disease in the US (from 1999 to 2016) broken down by age (https://wonder.cdc.gov/cmf-icd10.html). So, this doesn't include accidents or deaths due to genetic defects or prenatal issues, but it does include things like influenza, pneumonia, cancer, heart disease, etc. The picture changes a little if you include those other causes of death because they affect the young, but not much because, in the US, the number of deaths due to those causes is dwarfed by the number of deaths caused by disease.

So, how did you do? Did you get the first one right? I am guessing that only about half of you did because the graphs are almost indistinguishable. Here are both data sets displayed together for comparison.

What does this mean? It means that the older you are, the higher your risk of dying from disease in general, and the younger you are, the lower the risk. The trends are nearly the same whether you focus on COVID or all diseases.

So, if your point in bringing up the fact that COVID kills the elderly at a much higher rate is to help people remain calm, then go right ahead. No, this isn't going to kill us all and the odds are that even if you do get it, you will be fine.

However, if your point is to say that somehow this means that COVID isn't a big deal, then you are essentially saying that death and disease themselves are not a big deal. I am not sure that is an argument anyone should make. Even if most of the people who are dying are older and sicker, that doesn't make their deaths any less of a tragedy.

In the last 2.5 years, I have lost both of my grandfathers. Both were in their 80s and both suffered from severe dementia. In their last days, the cognitive decline was steep and they didn't even seem to know who I was. It was tough to watch them become a shell of what they once were and to see the suffering that they experienced along the way. But that didn't make their passing any less sad. I believe that death is always a big deal, and that every life is precious to God. Death is a tragedy whether the person is young and healthy or old and sick. I also believe that is not how life is supposed to work (see the book of Genesis) and I have hope that one day death will be defeated once and for all (see the book of Revelation). Until then, death is a reality we are stuck with, but that doesn't mean we have to like it.

So, if you disagree with how the government has handled the pandemic, that is fine. There is room for discussion about appropriate ways to balance managing risk, protecting freedom, preserving the economy, showing compassion to the vulnerable, and enjoying life. Every policy (such as lock-down or no lock-down, open schools or closed schools) has its trade-offs and managing those trade-offs is going to require nuanced discussion. But, can we have that discussion without downplaying the loss of life? As this one chart shows, death predominantly affects the elderly, and it IS a big deal.

PS. Sorry for the clickbait title. Sometimes I just can't help myself.