Age-adjusted mortality is at 2004 levels. Yet they tell us Covid is worse than the 1918 flu

Mises.org’s Ryan McMaken writes, “Last week, the media again tried to ratchet up the public’s fear over covid-19 by labeling it more deadly than the 1918 flu epidemic. ‘COVID-19 Is Now the Deadliest Disease in U.S. History,’ reads one headline from an NBC TV affiliate. Considering the realities of cancer and heart disease, that headline is absurdly false. Perhaps the author meant ‘communicable disease.’ A TIME headline was at least arguably factual, declaring, ‘COVID-19 Is Now the Deadliest Pandemic in American History.’

"Age-Adjusted Mortality Is at 2004 Levels. Yet They Tell Us Covid Is Worse Than the 1918 Flu" - @ryanmcmaken @mises https://t.co/H1OOh4LpJ9 pic.twitter.com/nr4kWTeXd4

— Jonathan Hamel (@jhamel) October 9, 2021

But even the TIME headline is only arguably true if stripped of all context. If we actually look at disease mortality proportionally to the population, the 1918 epidemic was far worse than covid. Considering that the US population in 1918 was one-third its current size, we find that deaths per million from the flu epidemic totaled about sixty-five hundred per million. Covid, by comparison currently comes in—in the official numbers—around twenty-two hundred per million.

But this is all part of a larger pattern—one well embraced by the media—of presenting information with as little context as possible.”

Read the entire column.