No. 7 - Saskatchewan's missing deaths
For most of 2022, Saskatchewan was one of the few parts of Canada that didn’t report any COVID-19 deaths.
Unlikely. And it was not likely — on January 21, public health announced that there had actually been nine deaths in that time period, and a data glitch bugged up this information from being properly reported.
(If you’re curious, the glitch was that the system wasn’t set to continue updating into the new year, according to the province’s CMOH)
Data glitches and problems have been common in this pandemic. Data dumps are common too, where many previously unreported COVID-19 deaths are reported together for one reason or another. But in Saskatchewan, the province’s Omicron death rate is being used by recent COVID-19 vector Scott Moe to argue that the province’s approach is working. Global News quoted Moe saying “However, Saskatchewan continues to report the lowest per capita COVID-19 fatality rate in Canada for the month of January, below provinces that have introduced the strictest lockdown policies.” And yes, officially, their death rate is lower than even PEI’s.
Saskatchewan has had about as many total cases per capita as Quebec, and more than BC, Ontario, Manitoba, Yukon and Atlantic Canada, according to PHAC. They have had the third highest rate of death in Canada. These are culmulative counts. Currently, Saskatchewan has the fourth highest number of active cases per capita and yes, the lowest death rate. There is good reason to be skeptical about Moe’s optimism and the death data dump doesn’t exactly exude confidence in any of the numbers.
(Though congrats, Saskatchewanians, for having some of the highest testing rates in Canada in the past two weeks).
Tara Moriarty, Canada’s COVID-19 death estimation queen (and professor of dentistry at U oF T) wrote a letter to Premier Moe voicing her concerns that the province is undercounting deaths and shared the text on Twitter.
She pointed out that Saskatchewan’s death counting is still stuck in 2020: only 70% of deaths in 2020 have been officially counted. It’s the only province that still lags. She wrote this, “Saskatchewan COVID-19 deaths reported to the Canadian Vital Statistics Death Database (CVSDD) up to November 28, 2020 are 2X higher than deaths reported contemporaneously by the province.”
Tara references a Royal Society of Canada study in which I was co-author that tried to better estimate Canada’s overall COVID-19 deaths, based on a variety of factors. I encourage you to read it if you have 30 minutes.
So, how does Moe respond? By clenching his fists and eyes and yelling fake news.
Well, not exactly — the physical description is Moe fanfic. But here’s the video:
(Shoutout to report co-author Eemaan Thind for her tweets about all of this or else I would have missed it!)
Our study’s estimates might be too high. They might be right on. We simply can’t know with the amount of missing information. But what we do know is that Moe is trying to use a data black hole to not have to answer to the pandemic’s most pressing question in Saskatchewan: how many people has this virus killed? And worse, he’s using this lack of information to demonstrate the incredible skill of his premiership.
As Eemaan’s research has shown, unreported, unknown deaths tend to be highest among people who are marginalized: Indigenous people, racialized people, poor people, the folks who died in their homes or died before they could get to hospital. With no post-mortem testing in Saskatchewn, we might never really know the true death toll. But what’s clear, it’s near certainly being under-reported.