What follows is an opinion from a United States Court of Appeals.
Intervenors who participated as parties at the courts of appeals should be counted as either appellants or respondents when it can be determined whose position they supported. For example, if there were two plaintiffs who lost in district court, appealed, and were joined by four intervenors who also asked the court of appeals to reverse the district court, the number of appellants should be coded as six.
In some cases there is some confusion over who should be listed as the appellant and who as the respondent. This confusion is primarily the result of the presence of multiple docket numbers consolidated into a single appeal that is disposed of by a single opinion. Most frequently, this occurs when there are cross appeals and/or when one litigant sued (or was sued by) multiple litigants that were originally filed in district court as separate actions. The coding rule followed in such cases should be to go strictly by the designation provided in the title of the case. The first person listed in the title as the appellant should be coded as the appellant even if they subsequently appeared in a second docket number as the respondent and regardless of who was characterized as the appellant in the opinion.
To clarify the coding conventions, consider the following hypothetical case in which the US Justice Department sues a labor union to strike down a racially discriminatory seniority system and the corporation (siding with the position of its union) simultaneously sues the government to get an injunction to block enforcement of the relevant civil rights law. From a district court decision that consolidated the two suits and declared the seniority system illegal but refused to impose financial penalties on the union, the corporation appeals and the government and union file cross appeals from the decision in the suit brought by the government. Assume the case was listed in the Federal Reporter as follows:
United States of America,
Plaintiff, Appellant
v
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendant, Appellee.
International Brotherhood of Widget Workers,AFL-CIO
Defendants, Cross-appellants
v
United States of America.
Widgets, Inc. & Susan Kuersten Sheehan, President & Chairman
of the Board
Plaintiff, Appellants,
v
United States of America,
Defendant, Appellee.
This case should be coded as follows:Appellant = United States, Respondents = International Brotherhood of Widget Workers Widgets, Inc., Total number of appellants = 1, Number of appellants that fall into the category "the federal government, its agencies, and officials" = 1, Total number of respondents = 3, Number of respondents that fall into the category "private business and its executives" = 2, Number of respondents that fall into the category "groups and associations" = 1.
Note that if an individual is listed by name, but their appearance in the case is as a government official, then they should be counted as a government rather than as a private person. For example, in the case "Billy Jones & Alfredo Ruiz v Joe Smith" where Smith is a state prisoner who brought a civil rights suit against two of the wardens in the prison (Jones & Ruiz), the following values should be coded: number of appellants that fall into the category "natural persons" =0 and number that fall into the category "state governments, their agencies, and officials" =2. A similar logic should be applied to businesses and associations. Officers of a company or association whose role in the case is as a representative of their company or association should be coded as being a business or association rather than as a natural person. However, employees of a business or a government who are suing their employer should be coded as natural persons. Likewise, employees who are charged with criminal conduct for action that was contrary to the company policies should be considered natural persons.
If the title of a case listed a corporation by name and then listed the names of two individuals that the opinion indicated were top officers of the same corporation as the appellants, then the number of appellants should be coded as three and all three were coded as a business (with the identical detailed code). Similar logic should be applied when government officials or officers of an association were listed by name.
Your specific task is to determine the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "natural persons". If the total number cannot be determined (e.g., if the appellant is listed as "Smith, et. al." and the opinion does not specify who is included in the "et.al."), then answer 99.

Opinion:
In re Michael P. KELLY. Michael P. KELLY, Individually and derivatively on behalf of Energy Conversion Corporation v. MELLON BANK (EAST) NATIONAL ASSOCIATION. Appeal of Michael P. KELLY, Individually and as an Authorized Corporate Officer on behalf of Energy Conversion Corporation.
No. 89-1012.
United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.
Submitted Under Third Circuit Rule 12(6) May 19, 1989.
Decided May 31, 1989.
Richard L. Caplan, Philadelphia, Pa., for appellant.
Walter Weir, Jr., Maureen R. Brown, Philadelphia, Pa., for appellee.
Before SLOVITER, COWEN and WEIS, Circuit Judges.
OPINION OF THE COURT
SLOVITER, Circuit Judge.
Plaintiff Michael Kelly appeals from the district court’s order denying his motion for leave to amend his complaint to add Energy Conversion Corp. (ECC) as a party plaintiff in his adversary proceeding against Mellon Bank (East) National Association (Mellon). Because this appeal was not taken from an appealable order, we do not have jurisdiction and we will dismiss the appeal.
I.
Kelly, a debtor under Chapter 13 of the Bankruptcy Code, filed an adversary proceeding against Mellon, alleging personal claims and derivative claims on behalf of ECC, a company of which Kelly was a director, officer, and majority shareholder. The adversary proceeding was automatically referred to the bankruptcy court but the parties consented to a withdrawal of the automatic referral and the adversary proceeding was transferred to the district court.
Kelly’s personal claims were based on allegations that Mellon fraudulently induced Kelly and his wife to personally guarantee repayment of money owed by ECC to Mellon. The derivative claims were based on allegations that Mellon breached an agreement to provide financing for ECC and effectively prevented ECC from securing financing from alternate spurces, thus forcing ECC into bankruptcy.
The district court dismissed Kelly’s derivative claims on the ground that he lacked standing to assert those claims but refused to dismiss his personal claims. The court also denied Kelly’s cross-motion to join ECC as a plaintiff, stating without further elucidation that the court lacked subject matter jurisdiction. After the district court denied Kelly’s motion to reconsider, Kelly appealed. Kelly argues that the district court erred in determining that there was no subject matter jurisdiction over the claim to be asserted by ECC against Mellon. We cannot reach the merits of Kelly’s argument at this time unless the matter is presently appealable.
II.
Patently the litigation in the district court on the merits is not over. Kelly’s personal claims against Mellon have not been adjudicated. The district court did not certify this issue for immediate appeal under 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b).
Orders permitting the addition of plaintiffs are clearly interlocutory, see Deckert v. Independence Shares Corp., 311 U.S. 282, 290-91 & n. 4, 61 S.Ct. 229, 234-35 & n. 4, 85 L.Ed. 189 (1940); Pennsylvania Co. for Insurances on Lives and Granting Annuities v. Deckert, 123 F.2d 979, 984 (3d Cir.1941), reviewable on appeal from a final judgment. Deckert, 311 U.S. at 291, 61 S.Ct. at 234-35. Similarly, denial of leave to amend pleadings is ordinarily not final. See Wells v. South Main Bank, 532 F.2d 1005 (5th Cir.1976).
Kelly contends, however, that this case falls within a “death knell” exception to the final order rule whereby orders which have the practical effect of terminating the litigation are treated as final orders. Kelly claims support for the applicability of the death knell rule from Gillespie v. United States Steel Corp., 379 U.S. 148, 85 S.Ct. 308, 13 L.Ed.2d 199 (1964), and United States v. Berkowitz, 328 F.2d 358 (3d Cir.), cert. denied, 379 U.S. 821, 85 S.Ct. 42, 13 L.Ed.2d 32 (1964).
In Gillespie, the Supreme Court held that an order dismissing plaintiffs’ state law and common law claims on the ground that the Jones Act provided the only remedy was appealable, despite the fact that the Jones Act claims remained pending after the dismissal. Gillespie, 379 U.S. at 152-54, 85 S.Ct. at 311-12. The Court decided that an immediate appeal was justified because plaintiffs’ interest in prompt resolution of the continuing validity of the dismissed claims outweighed the interest in preventing piecemeal litigation and because the case involved a controlling issue of law and would have come within the policy of 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b) had the district court certified it. Id. at 153-54, 85 S.Ct. at 311— 12.
More recent Supreme Court cases have repeatedly reiterated that exceptions to the finality rule, such as the collateral order doctrine, are to be narrowly applied. See Firestone Tire & Rubber Co. v. Risjord, 449 U.S. 368, 374-78, 101 S.Ct. 669, 673-76, 66 L.Ed.2d 571 (1981); Coopers & Lybrand v. Livesay, 437 U.S. 463, 98 S.Ct. 2454, 57 L.Ed.2d 351 (1978). In Coopers & Lyb-rand the Supreme Court limited Gillespie to its “unique facts,” noting also that in Gillespie the finality issues had not been presented until argument before the Court on the merits, 437 U.S. at 477 n. 30, 98 S.Ct. at 2462 n. 30. It stressed that allowance of appeals from inherently nonfinal orders which turned on issues of fact would defeat the purpose of section 1291. Id. The issue that Kelly seeks to have resolved on this appeal, the subject matter jurisdiction of the district court to hear ECC’s claims against Mellon, turns on the facts of the case with limited, if any, relevance beyond. Thus to the extent that the Gillespie rationale remains viable, it is inapplicable here, and the interest in preventing piecemeal litigation prevents us from treating this matter as appealable.
Berkowitz, which was decided the same year as Gillespie, also affords plaintiff no assistance. In Berkowitz, we held that an order refusing to transfer venue was ap-pealable where process could not be served in the transferor jurisdiction and a new action would be time-barred in the jurisdiction where service could be effected. 328 F.2d at 360. Because the refusal to transfer would have the effect of terminating the suit we held that there were sufficient “ ‘indicia of finality’ ” to warrant allowing an immediate appeal. Id. (quoting Brown Shoe Co. v. United States, 370 U.S. 294, 308, 82 S.Ct. 1502, 1514, 8 L.Ed.2d 510 (1962)).
Kelly argues that because ECC’s claims in other fora may now be time-barred, the court’s order is effectively final as to ECC. Mellon on the other hand suggests that not only are ECC’s claims not time-barred, but they are currently pending in state court. Even if this were not so, the district court’s order would not be appealable at this time.
After Kelly’s personal claims have been finally adjudicated, he will be able to obtain appellate review of the district court’s denial of his motion to amend the complaint. Additionally, Kelly’s right, after the resolution of his personal claims, to appeal the district court’s dismissal of his derivative claims also acts to preserve his rights. Because Kelly’s rights are not practically terminated by the district court’s order, Ber-kowitz is inapplicable. Moreover, we note that the order at issue concerns only Kelly’s right to amend the complaint to add ECC as a party; ECC has not moved to intervene.
Finally, even if the order denying leave to amend to add a party were final in the context of 28 U.S.C. § 1291, which is implausible, there has been no certification by the district court as required under Fed.R. Civ.P. 54(b) to make a separate claim ap-pealable. Thus the order would not be appealable at this time in any event.
III.
For the reasons set forth above, we will dismiss the appeal.

Question: What is the total number of appellants in the case that fall into the category "natural persons"? Answer with a number.

Choices:

Answer: 1