Gary Burgess: Jersey’s Covid death toll has doubled in a month
In the week that the grim milestone of 100,000 Covid deaths was surpassed in the UK, a different – but significant – moment was reached in Jersey.
The number of registered Covid deaths in the island rose to 64.
Why does that matter?
Well for the whole of March to November, before the second wave hit, there were 32 Covid deaths.
Since December, in little more than a month, that has doubled.
The most recent, confirmed just yesterday.
As it happens, the actual number is even higher, but because of the delays in the reporting process the official number is now 64.
Every time I write about Covid deaths in Jersey I get the same couple of responses from a small but vocal minority of people: first is asking whether they died “with” or “of” Covid, the second is raising the possibility that some or all all had underlying health conditions – the inference being they’d have died anyway.
Well, let’s be clear on this one. The Jersey reporting of Covid deaths is exactly the same as the UK’s, in that it doesn’t distinguish between “with” and “of”. And having an underlying health condition does not automatically mean that if you contract Covid-19 you’ll die, so to imply as much is just grossly offensive.
So what do we know about these people who’ve died?
Well 37 died in hospital, 25 died in care homes, and two died at home. 3 were in their 50s, 3 in their 60s, 16 in their 70s, 30 in their 80s and 12 in their 90s. In other words, not all were “on death’s door” and due to depart any time soon, as some would have you believe.
These statistics also beg a comparison.
64 from a population of 108,000 is a death rate of 59.2 per 100,000. That compares to 20.6 in Guernsey, 29.6 in the Isle of Man, 152.8 in the UK, and 0.5 in New Zealand.
What can we determine from these numbers?
Well, our situation is certainly better than the UK’s in terms of the Covid death rate, but we don’t compare well with our Crown Dependency counterparts around the British Isles.
I throw New Zealand into the mix to make another comparison. In absolute numbers terms, a nation with a population of 4.9 million people has had 25 deaths in total. It shows what’s possible.
But every approach is a political choice, and it’s not fair to compare New Zealand with Jersey. Their ability to close the border and have all they need within their shores isn’t quite the same in Jersey where medical patients need to come and go and where the government has deemed certain essential workers need to come and go to keep things running.
I’ll leave others to decide whether such a determination is correct.
In the past six weeks there has seemingly been a shift in power in Jersey - with multiple STAC minutes suggesting the focus has gone from the economy to people's health.
Too little, too late, for some. Certainly – based on inarguable evidence - too slow to have stemmed that rise which peaked at a thousand cases around Christmas. But, in January, and 32 further deaths later, the island is in a much better place.
This week’s delay to the reopening of non-essential retail, because of those delivery drivers going to work with Covid symptoms and not wearing PPE, is the latest evidence of the medical advice being followed.
It will be for a future public inquiry to analyse the decisions made throughout the pandemic.
For now, as the number of people dead with Covid in Jersey has doubled in little more than a month, spare a thought for the families and friends of the dead grieving their loss, and let’s all redouble our own efforts to follow that really simple ‘hands face space’ advice.
The virus is here to stay. But the disease doesn’t need to be. That’s why us all helping keep a lid on things while the vaccination programme is rolled out is the greatest act of civic duty.
It means, within months, life as we know it can be better. And we should all welcome that.