Here we have the total number of deaths in Canada over the past four years. The most recent 12 months of data do not suggest a spike in deaths relative to historical trends.

#COVID19Canada #COVID19 #Canada

Zooming out nationally over the past decade, we see that it's perfectly natural for deaths in one year to exceed deaths in the previous year.

***This does not necessarily = excess deaths.***

Look how often the blue growth line is above 0%.

So deaths are rising.

Is that due to population growth?

Population aging?

It's a bit of both, but not covid.

Here we have the chart you saw earlier now expressed as a rate per 100,000 people. Generally, a flatter trend in death rates would suggest that population growth may be the key factor driving growth in total deaths.

Across the decade, again we see that when we adjust for population growth, the growth trend is weaker but still there - the aging of the population is likely the primary factor.

Deaths are rising in absolute and relative terms, suggesting a combo of population growth and aging.

Too early to draw conclusions on what this means but here are leading causes of death in Canada over the past 4 years.

Many recent deaths remain unclassified in the "information unavailable" column and will presumably will properly attributed over time.

Here is the same, presented as rates per 100,000 population to account for population growth.

A key question to address as this data evolves is the degree to which deaths attributed to covid-19 have substituted for deaths attributed to other causes.

Note that Covid-19 is often not a wholly distinct and separate cause of death as there are other medical conditions involved in many cases.

There are also cases in which it is not even a cause of death, but the individual had tested positive sometime prior to their death.

Canada total monthly deaths 2017-2020.