Short-term forecasts of expected deaths
Open accessAbstract
Significance: We introduce a simple but powerful method for analyzing mortality after a major shock. We apply the method to show, more conclusively than up to now, that Denmark, which imposed a lockdown during the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic, suffered considerably lower risks of death than Sweden, which did not impose a lockdown. Our method makes short-term forecasts of the number of deaths that would have occurred if the coronavirus pandemic or other health catastrophe had not occurred. By subtracting the forecast counts from actual death counts, excess mortality can be estimated. This can be done by age, sex, and other characteristics. The method can also be used for other kinds of short-term forecasting.
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Estimates of expected deaths should ideally account for recent temporal trends in mortality that are likely to have occurred in the absence of the pandemic.
“However, estimates of expected deaths should ideally account for recent temporal trends in mortality that are likely to have occurred in the absence of the pandemic.”
From Excess deaths associated with covid-19 pandemic in 2020: age and sex disaggregated time series analysis in 29 high income countries (2021) · cites this paper as [24]
The variability around estimated excess death in children <15 years is larger than in other age groups owing to sparse data.
“the variability around the estimated excess death in children <15 years is larger than in other age groups owing to sparse data.”
From Excess deaths associated with covid-19 pandemic in 2020: age and sex disaggregated time series analysis in 29 high income countries (2021) · cites this paper as [24]
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- Authors
- Rizzi, S., & Vaupel, J. W.
- Affiliations
- University of Southern Denmark (DK)
- Corresponding author
- Vaupel, James W.
- Venue
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- Publisher
- National Academy of Sciences
- Published
- 2021-03-26
- Volume
- 118
- Issue
- 15
- ISSN
- 0027-8424 (ISSN-L)
- 1091-6490
- PMC
- PMC8053952
- OpenAlex
- W3137336626
- Cited by
- 18
- References
- 35
- Citations by year
- 2025: 2 · 2024: 2 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 5
- FWCI
- 6.29
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- University of Southern Denmark Research Portal (University of Southern Denmark) (submittedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- Funders
- ROCKWOOL Foundation (Excess Death Grant)
- AXA Research Fund (AXA Chair in Longevity Research)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Demography › Insurance, Mortality, Demography, Risk Management
- Physical Sciences › Mathematics › Modeling and Simulation › COVID-19 epidemiological studies
- Physical Sciences › Mathematics › Statistics and Probability › Statistical Methods in Epidemiology
- Keywords
- excess mortality, COVID-19 pandemic, lockdown policy, Denmark, Sweden, prediction intervals
- MeSH terms
- COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, Adolescent, Adult, Aged, Aged, 80 and over, Child, Child, Preschool, Denmark, Female, Forecasting, Humans, Infant, Infant, Newborn, Male, Middle Aged, Sweden, Young Adult, Pandemics
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