The interactive tool brings together data from the ONS other relevant agencies to help pension schemes understand the impact of COVID-19 on mortality rates in 2020. It allows users to focus on the impact of the pandemic on particular demographic groups, such as age and sex. It also allows comparisons against a range of historic measures.
The ONS and other relevant sources have reported that around 45,000 people have been registered as dying from COVID-19 related causes in the UK this year up to 15 May 2020. The XPS COVID-19 Tracker forecasts that the total is close to 50,000 today.
In addition, the tracker forecasts there have been a further 20,000 excess deaths this year to date compared to the same period in 2019. Excess deaths include those which were directly linked to COVID-19 and not reported as such, particularly during the early stages of the pandemic, or those which were due to people not getting necessary medical help due to fears of catching the virus.
Steve Leake, XPS Head of Longevity said “It is becoming clear that the key drivers of COVID-19 deaths include age, location, underlying health conditions, sex and deprivation. Being able to track against previous years gives us fresh insight into COVID-19’s impact. For instance, while we cannot know for certain why the excess deaths occurred, when compared with previous years, the inconsistent rise in numbers for a few weeks at the start of the pandemic 2020 indicates they are highly likely to be COVID-19 related.
“Our XPS COVID-19 Tracker is one of a number of tools we have developed to help pension schemes monitor and model the impact of the pandemic on their members.”
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