Philippines 2018 - 2020 Deaths by Ages

First review of deaths by age: could the same factor that resulted in higher deaths in older persons in 2020, have resulted in lower deaths in the pediatric population in 2020?

Early in 2020 I recall watching international news sources discussing that there was an apparent anomaly of reduced pediatric deaths in 2020. There was some discussion on whether this could be related to lack of attendance at “well child” visits. I did not see any conclusions drawn nor recent discussions on this topic.

In preparation for review of age-related deaths in 2021, when that data is available to our team, I reviewed the available by age death data for the Philippines from 2018 to 2020.

In 2020 we see an increase in deaths in late middle age and elderly group and a drop in pediatric deaths. The significance of each needs to be determined.

I looked further at the pediatric groups; there was a 20 - 22% drop in deaths in the under 1 age group deaths when comparing 2020 to 2018 and 2019, a 37% drop in deaths in the 1 - 4 age group, and a 26 - 29% drop in the 5 to 9 yo. There are smaller drops in older pediatric age groups.

I pose the question. Could the lack of access to medical care that possibly contributed to higher deaths in the older adults group, have equally contributed to considerably less deaths in the young pediatric population? It seems counter-intuitive! Worth a much deeper dive!