The death rate in the first and second waves of Covid-19 could have been staggeringly higher if the crude rate had mirrored countries with similar populations.
Australia could have had between 15,000 and 48,000 deaths during the first two waves of Covid-19 if the country had experienced the same crude case and death rates as Canada, Sweden and the United Kingdom, according to a new government report.
The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare analysed the first year of Covid-19 in Australia and found that if the country hadn’t enforced its strict measures in March/April 2020, and again in Victoria between June-September, the health system would have been put under “extreme pressure”.
As a result, the number of deaths could have been between 15 and 46 times higher than the number as of May 2021 – 909.
The report did not include data from the latest wave of cases that began in June 2021, dominated by the Delta variant.
The report compared Australia with Canada, Sweden, the UK and New Zealand because they had “similar proportions of people over 65’ similar life expectancy and similar health systems and expenditure on health care”, AIHW spokesperson Lynelle Moon said.
“If Australia had experienced the same crude case and death rates as Canada, Sweden or the United Kingdom, by early April 2021 there would have been between 680,000 and two million cases instead of the 29,000 that did occu, and between 16,000 and 48,000 deaths,” Dr Moon said.
“Conversely, if Australia had the same crude case and death rates as New Zealand, there would have been around 18,000 fewer cases and 780 fewer deaths.”
The report found it was “not possible to determine” the reasons why some countries had contained the virus better than others.
“However, it is likely that countries that had a strong response across a number of relevant areas had the highest chance of containing the virus,” the report states.
“This type of response minimises the chances of outbreaks in the first place but also … the capacity to bring them under control when they do occur.
“Some of the factors that may have influenced … include the timing and strictness of population health interventions, level of testing and genomic sequencing, strength of the public health system, clarity and consistency of communication by governments, how much public health responses were based on scientific evidence and pandemic preparedness.”
Of the 909 deaths that were included in the report, four times as many Covid-deaths occurred in the lowest socio-economic group compared with the highest socio-economic group.
The report found Covid-19 was responsible for more than 8400 years of lost life, but this was less than other diseases – including coronary heart disease, responsible for 312,000 lost years in 2018.
“Covid-19 would rank about 135th out of 219 diseases in terms of total burden of disease,” Dr Moon said.
The report found death rates for flu, pneumonia and chronic lower respiratory infectious were lower in 2020 than in the previous five-year average.
There was also a reduction in road deaths and presentations to hospital emergency departments with road-related injuries.
Suicide rates have remained at pre-pandemic levels, and while the initial impacts of the pandemic resulted in increased levels of psychological distress on young adults, the average level had returned to pre-pandemic levels by April 2021.
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