The process of reconciling COVID-19 death data is all set to be completed in a week. Of the 235 deaths being analysed in Chennai as part of the reconciliation process, 49 are being closely looked at to ascertain if COVID-19 was the cause.
Earlier this month, the Directorate of Public Health and Preventive Medicine constituted a committee to reconcile COVID-19 death reports of the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC). Official sources in the Health Department said that the committee was reconciling the data, case by case, to do away with ambiguity and was also asking for more information from hospitals.
Looking closely
“The committee is analysing 235 deaths. The members are of the opinion that 49 of these deaths are not related to COVID-19. Though these persons tested positive for COVID-19, they say that the deaths were due to other reasons. They are looking at each of these casesheets. We have also asked them for details,” an official said.
“We will go by norms laid down by the Indian Council of Medical Research [on COVID-19 death data]. Similar exercises were done in Delhi and Maharashtra too,” he added.
But how did the disparity in reporting deaths arise? Official sources said that many factors were at play.
“New private hospitals are included in the COVID-19 treatment list, and many of them took time to understand the format of reporting COVID-19 deaths. Some of them did not share the entire information. On one hand, this was done thinking it would not be necessary, while on the other, it was masked purposefully in some hospitals,” an official source said.
Secondly, every death certificate should be signed by the doctor responsible or in-charge of the intensive care unit, but in many private hospitals, there were issues after doctors refused to sign, citing that they were only consultants. This delayed the process, and when this reached late, the question of how to include them came up, he added.
Delayed reporting
“If a death is reported seven days later, there is no clarity on who will decide whether to declare it or not. Many deaths were not declared on the same day due to want of information such as time and date of admission,” he said. In some instances, there was no clarity from clinicians on the co-morbid conditions of the deceased.
“In the initial stages of the pandemic, there were home deaths that included persons who left hospitals against medical advice,” he said. All these, he said, were accounted for in the burial grounds of the GCC, but did not tally with deaths declared by the Health Department. “Hence, a case by case study is being done,” he added.