CFABO Is Wrong About COVID-19 Death Toll

The Committee for a Better Ohio is spreading false information about the coronavirus in Ohio and flouting recommended safety precautions. They say COVID-19 deaths are “well within norms”, but the mortality data clearly shows a much higher number of deaths in 2020.

Monthly Ohio Death Totals Are Far Above Average, Not “Well Within Norms”

The Committee defines an “alarming rate” of death as “more Ohioans than ever” dead. In fact, for all causes of death, 2020 has seen at least 5,691 more deaths than 2019 so far (as of 10/28). Overall deaths are actually much more than any of the previous 5 years.

The Ohio Department of Health provides mortality data reporting tools freely available to anyone with an internet connection, which I’ve used to populate the chart below for all causes of death for the first 9 months of every year since 2015.

Prior to the virus, the first few months of 2020 had a typical number of deaths. COVID-19 appeared in Ohio in early March and spread to 1,000 cases by the end of that month. Afterward, every month in 2020 from April through September has had the highest death toll of any of the last 6 years.

Note that the previous 3 years have had very stable death totals, giving us a good baseline for comparison to the current year. Typically the difference in death totals year over year has been within 1%, with 2017 being an outlier at 3.76% increase (see the bottom row). So far, 2020 has seen a 6.18% increase in total deaths, much higher than even the outlier year, with 3 months left to be counted. These numbers are obviously not “well within norms” as the CFABO claims.

Also, the total Ohio population has been relatively flat for the last decade, growing only about 2% in the last 5 years. I’ve compared 2020 deaths to the average of the previous 5 years, to rule out any outliers, and this shows an even higher increase in deaths at 6,842 excess deaths above average in 2020 (see the last 2 columns on the right). By the Committee’s own definition, this is an “alarming” increase in deaths.

COVID-19 Deaths and CFABO’s Flawed Analysis

All the numbers above are deaths from all causes. As for coronavirus specifically, the Department of Health puts the state’s COVID-19 death toll at 5,239 so far this year (as of 10/28). Notice this is less than the total excess deaths from all causes, suggesting that the real number could be even higher.

At the national level, over 230,000 have died of COVID-19 so far in less than a year, far surpassing the last major flu pandemic of 1957, which killed 116,000 in the U.S. over 2 years. COVID-19 is second only to the 1918 flu pandemic which caused 675,000 U.S. deaths over 2 years.

Despite these facts, CFABO and its executive Conrad Allen have posted multiple videos of flawed data analysis which don’t account for the lag in recent data reporting (which the DoH clearly labels as “preliminary”), resulting in their faulty estimation that total deaths in Ohio for 2020 would actually be less than last year.

The existing data already shows that they’re wrong. Once this year wraps up and the data finishes rolling in toward the end of January, we will clearly see just how wrong they were.

Other COVID Misinformation from CFABO

CFABO’s COVID page says, “we purposefully ignore case counts,” undermining test positivity rates which give us statistically valuable insight into the spread of the virus. They cast the true COVID death total as unknowable, echoing the misconception that comorbidities inflate the reported numbers. CFABO puts the COVID mortality rate for all age ranges, including 80 year olds, at less than half a percent, whereas a peer reviewed scientific paper from November 2020 contradicts that starkly, putting 80 year olds’ mortality rate at 8.29% on average, 10.83% for men and 5.76% for women.

CFABO Defies Recommended Health Precautions

Not only is the Committee spreading misinformation about the virus, they are also encouraging people to gather without masks or social distancing, defying both state guidelines and those of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Just a few days ago Conrad Allen spoke at an indoor event they promoted where attendees can be seen without masks.

The real Bottom-Line is that The Committee for a Better Ohio and Conrad Allen are misleading Ohioans with false information and risking the health of their followers by doing so.

2 More Months of Above Average Deaths, Yet Pandemic Denial Persists (12/9 Update)

We now have 2 more months of data since this original post. Comparing 2020 Ohio deaths to 2019 deaths for these months, we see a 10% and 16% increase in number of deaths respectively from all causes in Ohio:
October: 11,349 – 10,242 = 1,107
November: 12,080 – 10,415 = 1,665

Despite these facts, CFABO continues to promote the falsehood that the 2020 death rate is “within norms” with this Facebook post from yesterday:

Posing the suggestion as a hypothetical question does not absolve them of their culpability for spreading the falsehood. The vast majority of the 168 comments responded that there is no pandemic, despite the fact that COVID-19 has spread throughout the world and is the second deadliest virus in US history. The post was shared over 200 times within 24 hours.

They continue to spread misinformation even as we experience the largest surge of new COVID-19 cases in the state, exceeding 12,000 in one day and reaching daily averages more than 7 times what we experienced during the summer peak. Daily hospitalizations are also around 3 times higher than the summer.

Ohio has over 8,500 additional deaths this year so far compared to 2019, and that number continues to climb as new COVID-19 deaths average about 60 per day right now.

Year End Mortality Review (2/15 Update)

It’s time for a final check on Ohio’s actual death count for 2020.

December had the single highest deaths of any month in 2020, a stunning 65% increase compared to 2019:
December: 17,011 – 11,034 = 5,977

In the end, the 2020 total for all Ohio deaths was nearly 140,000. That’s over 16,000 more deaths than the stable 3 year average of 123,883, a 13% increase. According to the Ohio Department of Health, over 14,000 of those deaths are so far known to be attributed to COVID-19.

Nationwide, COVID-19 deaths are fast approaching 500,000, adding 100,000 per month. At this rate we could reach Spanish Flu number of deaths, but thankfully vaccines are now rolling out all around the country to hopefully turn the tide.

The Committee for a Better Ohio projected that “Ohio’s overall deaths for 2020 will be well within norms” and “2,750 less deaths predicted in Ohio in 2020 over 2019.” They have objectively and spectacularly failed to reflect the reality of the pandemic and cannot be trusted to serve the best interests of Ohioans.

CFABO Continues Actively Discouraging Mask Wearing (2/27)