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upstart writes in with an IRC submission for guy_:

England to revise DOWN its Covid-19 death toll by up to 10 percent after bizarre 'counting mishap':

Public Health England [(PHE)] currently counts the deaths of all people who have tested positive for Covid-19 among the coronavirus fatality total whether their death was related to the disease or not, an error which was noted in July, prompting the suspension of the daily death toll and an "urgent review" of protocol.

In other words, as many as 4,170 fatalities could be wiped off England's current Covid-19 death toll of 41,686.

According to reports in UKmedia, Secretary of State for Health and Social Care Matt Hancock will bring all coronavirus fatality reporting in line with Scotland and Northern Ireland public health models, wherein a death is marked as Covid-19-related only if it occurs within 28 days of a positive test.

[...]

In England, of all deaths that occurred up to 24 July (registered up 1 August), 49,017 involved #COVID19. For the same period, @DHSCgovuk reported 41,143 COVID-19 deaths https://t.co/hKH0tTRb2W

— Office for National Statistics (ONS) (@ONS) August 4, 2020

If the system is not updated, the total of roughly 265,000 confirmed cases in England would all eventually be counted as Covid-19 fatalities regardless of the actual cause of death.

Original Submission