You know of course, QVD, that the factcheckers move in when there is truth in the story.
I went through this with my brother early last year. He swore black and blue that people were dying like flies, when they were at the time counting any death at all as covid.
Article fro March 23, 2020
Case-Fatality Rate and Characteristics of Patients Dying in Relation to COVID-19 in Italy | Critical Care Medicine | JAMA | JAMA Network
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2763667Definition of COVID-19–Related DeathsA second possible explanation for the high Italian case-fatality rate may be how COVID-19–related deaths are identified in Italy. Case-fatality statistics in Italy are based on defining COVID-19–related deaths as those occurring in patients who test positive for SARS-CoV-2 via RT-PCR, independently from preexisting diseases that may have caused death. This method was selected because clear criteria for the definition of COVID-19–related deaths is not available.Electing to define death from COVID-19 in this way may have resulted in an overestimation of the case-fatality rate. A subsample of 355 patients with COVID-19 who died in Italy underwent detailed chart review. Among these patients, the mean age was 79.5 years (SD, 8.1) and 106 (30.0%) were women. In this sample, 117 patients (30%) had ischemic heart disease, 126 (35.5%) had diabetes, 72 (20.3%) had active cancer, 87 (24.5%) had atrial fibrillation, 24 (6.8%) had dementia, and 34 (9.6%) had a history of stroke. The mean number of preexisting diseases was 2.7 (SD, 1.6). Overall, only 3 patients (0.8%) had no diseases, 89 (25.1%) had a single disease, 91 (25.6%) had 2 diseases, and 172 (48.5%) had 3 or more underlying diseases. The presence of these comorbidities might have increased the risk of mortality independent of COVID-19 infection.COVID-19–related deaths are not clearly defined in the international reports available so far, and differences in definitions of what is or is not a COVID-19–related death might explain variation in case-fatality rates among different countries. To better understand the actual causes of death, the ISS is now reviewing the complete medical records of all patients with positive RT-PCR results who have died in Italy