@Senna posted:It is the right interpretation. Any other interpretation is incorrect.
Here's the exact wording from the CDC on how death certificates are filled out. You can find it at https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/dvs/blue_form.pdf
"The cause-of-death section consists of two parts. Part I is for reporting a chain of events leading directly to death, with the immediate cause of death (the final disease, injury, or complication directly causing death) on Line a and the underlying cause of death (the disease or injury that initiated the chain of morbid events that led directly and inevitably to death) on the lowest used line.
Part II is for reporting all other significant diseases, conditions, or injuries that contributed to death but which did not result in the underlying cause of death given in Part I. The cause-of-death information should be YOUR best medical OPINION. A condition can be listed as “probable” even if it has not been definitively diagnosed."I
It works like this:
- If an otherwise healthy person contracts COVID-19 and dies from it, and the examining doctor can find no other underlying illnesses that could have contributed to death, the decedent will have only an immediate cause of death listed, which would be COVID-19. That's the 6%.
- If a person had a preexisting condition (say, had a partial lung removal), then contracted COVID-19 and died because their reduced lung capacity prevented them from recovering from COVID-19, then the immediate cause of death would be listed as COVID-19 (line 1 of Part I), with the partial lung removal being the primary underlying cause (bottom line of Part I). These people are part of the 94%
- A friend of mine had this exact issue, but fortunately survived after 3 weeks in ICU.
- If a person contracts COVID-19, then, during the course of the infection, develops complications that ultimately take their life (say, ARDS), then the complications (ARDS) will be listed as the immediate cause of death (line 1 of Part I), with COVID-19 being listed as the primary underlying cause (bottom line of Part I). These people are also part of the 94%.
As for Part II, that's where all the other items go that contribute to the death. So items like obesity, smoking, etc. will go there.
All of these deaths, no matter where COVID-19 is listed, are because of COVID-19, regrettably.
If you don't understand it, here's something that may help, grim and regrettable as it may be:
Everyone knows that Chadwick Boseman died on Friday (rest in power). And you will undoubtedly read that he died of colon cancer. But what killed him wasn't necessarily the cancer in his colon. Rather, it was in all likelihood the spread of the cancer to the lymph nodes, and then on to other organs (such as the liver or pancreas). So while line 1 of Part I of his autopsy may list something such as liver failure as the immediate cause of death, the primary underlying cause will be colon cancer. Hence, he died because of colon cancer.
People rarely die in a vacuum, and the death process is often complex as hell. And COVID-19 seems hellbent on finding new and innovative ways to challenge the body.
I hope this helps to explain why any other interpretation of the death statistics is incorrect, and why there is no smoking gun, nor light at the end of the tunnel in this CDC data.
There are many resource pieces out last night and this morning providing this same very straight forward information that Senna (and Anotherparent prior) has stated, clearing up much of the misinterpretation (yes, interpretation) of the 6% CDC findings. These expanded explanations can be found, among other places, in plenty of outlets that pass the neutral media fact check process that some others have wisely suggested.
We still have very complex issues surrounding this pandemic and no easy solutions coming from either political perspective, science or anywhere in between. Bringing it back to baseball... hopefully we will figure out how to work together better to get to a place where kids are playing everywhere again.