22 Feb 2022 - Updated Birth and Death Data from Philippines Statistics Authority. Still Alarming!

Compared to 2019; from Jan to October 2021 there were 229,405 excess registered deaths and 296,340 fewer registered births. This represents a population loss of about 525,745 persons.

PSA updated their population data (https://psa.gov.ph/vital-statistics/id/166305) on 22 February 2022. An additional 2,198 registered deaths were added to the previous January to September data, 1,202 of which were added to September 2021. October, November, and December data were added, with October data now being reasonably complete.

Excess deaths for 2021 now stand at 44%, or nearly 230,000 between February and October of 2021. The October registered deaths will still rise with the input of delayed registration data; November and December data are still too incomplete to assess.

2019 was the last year of “normal” births with on average 4,586 live births being registered each day (daily average of 4,541 between January - October). For the same period in 2021, the average daily registered births were 3,581, a daily drop of 960 babies not born!

PSA also updated their cause of death data (https://psa.gov.ph/vital-statistics/id/166304) with reference to their current Jan to November data. Their top 3 causes of death were Ischemic Heart Disease (17.9% share) which compared to 2020 increased by 31% (30,474 additional deaths), Cerebrovascular Diseases (9.7% share) which increased by 16.6% (9,704 additional deaths), and Covid (9.6% share) (virus identified) which contributed 67,494 deaths.

It is interesting to note that the DOH Covid death tracker for 2021, perhaps more accurate in reporting deaths “from” rather than “with” registered only 39,301 deaths for the same period. There was also a category for assumed covid deaths labelled “covid-19 virus not identified” which reported 29,718 deaths. Reported cancer deaths were slightly lower than 2020 at 54,853 (a drop of 6,077), while diabetes attributed deaths were higher by 8,154 at 44,491. “Other” causes of death the final category increased considerably to 41,136 from 25,397 in 2020.

All very interesting data to evaluate at more depth, considering that the reductions in some would not be expected at the same time as increases in others, if those were to simply be attributed to the known increased poverty and less access to medical care. I would expect that Dr. / hospital policy on how to record deaths will skew this data, particularly where there were multiple comorbidities, but only one may be listed as primary cause.

Urgent independent assessment of these excess deaths is highly recommended, with additional data collected particularly with regards to vaccine status and it’s timing relative to death, regardless of documented case. This is necessary to address the escalating concerns on whether the vaccine rollouts have any contribution to the rapidly mounting, unprecedented, excess deaths.

This data will be further updated when PSA provides additional updates.