Is It True That Covid-19 Poses Serious Risks To Young and Old Alike?
By: Matthew Bottomley
Tags: Covid 19, Data, UK, Data Visualization

Covid-19|What the Data Shows

Is It True That Covid-19 Poses Serious Risks To Young and Old Alike? Matthew Bottomley Follow Nov 26 · 4 min read

Confused by various sources of information that circulate about Covid 19? You are not alone. Within a series of articles I aim to get to the bottom of the numbers by taking a detailed look at the official numbers here within the UK.

Within this, my second look at the data I want to get to the bottom of a simple question? Do I need to worry about my kids as well as my parents?

The data is sourced from the UK Government:

Daily flash numbers on a website dedicated to coronavirus data: https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ . Official data on UK deaths provided by the Office of National Statistics.

My first article focussed on answering the simple question — how many people have died/are dying because of Covid-19 rather than due to a combination of other factors — ie with Covid-19.

Subsequent articles will examine:

What is happening across the various regions of the UK? Essentially are we all in it together?

What does the data tell us about the Second Wave?

So, What Does The Data Have to Say About Age?

We know from my first article that some 60,000 people have died to date (week ending 13th November) in the UK because of Covid-19. Has this struck equally?

Unsurprisingly, the risk of dying with Covid-19 increases dramatically with age. But that is not the whole story as the chart below shows…

weekly deaths by age band England and Wales

This chart clearly demonstrates the impact of the initial outbreak of Covid–19 and indicates the beginning of a second wave as the UK moves into Autumn.

The impact on the number of deaths increases with each age band, the youngest band with a visible increase is 45–49 although perhaps the first real blip of not is within the 50–54 year age band.

There is very little movement across the entire period in the younger bands.

65 and Over

Taking a closer look at the categories over 65 clearly demonstrates that the brunt of the Covid 19 deaths come from the elderly within society.

Adding a trend line from last year (2019) enables us to see the normal seasonal effect on deaths in this age group. From this we can see that:

The impact of the initial outbreak.

The fact that cases fell to normal levels over the summer months

A period across summer where deaths were actually below normal levels, suggesting that people who would ordinarily have died in those weeks may have died earlier with the initial outbreak.

Clear signs of a second wave as the UK enters Autumn.

So overall, yes I need to be concerned about my parents catching Covid-19.

Under 65

Under 65 age shows a different story, where as under 45 shows a totally different story as the chart below shows:

England and Wales Deaths By Age Band under 65

Note: the chart is stacked (ie each segment builds on the one below).

Essentially the chart shows that under 45 there is very little if any change to prior years. There was some impact during the initial outbreak. Based on news coverage/etc it is possible that this was a result of the hospitals struggling to cope and also potentially reflects deaths of younger key workers who experienced heavy viral loads at that time.

Signs of the ‘second wave’ are visible in the over 45 age categories.

A Closer Look At the Under 30's

Summary

Comparing each age band to prior years allows us to break down the impact of Covid-19 on deaths to date during 2020 and demonstrates that age remains the dominant factor in the risk of death:

Under 14 years old — within normal parameters 15 to 44 years old — an additional 550 deaths (4% change on 2019) 45 to 64 years old — an additional 7k deaths (12% increase on 2019 and 11% of total Covid-19 Deaths) 64 to 74 years old — an additional 9k deaths (12% increase over 2019 and c14% of total Covid-19 deaths)) Over 75 years old — an additional 50k deaths (15% increase over 2019 and over 75% of Covid-19 deaths)

In summary, based on actual death data the risk to our children of dying from Covid-19 is negligible. The risk to healthy middle aged adults is also very small, but the risk to the elderly amongst us is much greater.

Note: there is research that indicates that obesity, hyper-tension (high blood pressure and stress) and other Co-Morbidity factors are essential to understanding the survival rates/risk factors within individual age bands.

Addendum

The chart below takes a closer look at the last part of the year, Autumn and Winter and compares current year data with last year.

Again it’s clear that the death rate for those under 45 is unaffected, but it’s possible to see the older groups begin to diverge from normal seasonal trends.