Grave diggers carry the coffin of a Covid-19 patient, in a funeral section provided for victims of coronavirus, outside Moscow on May 26. Pavel Golovkin / AP
Moscow’s health authorities have revised the number of deaths from the city’s corona virus for April, revealing that more than twice as many people died than previously reported.
Officials raised the number of documented deaths attributed to Covid-19 to 1,561 up from 636.
CNN and other news outlets reported in mid-May that Moscow saw a surge in deaths in April, adding around 1,800 deaths compared to the previous year’s average.
The official number of Covid-19 deaths in Russia is relatively low compared to countries with the same number of infections as a whole, and observers question the official counting method that allows death in patients who test positive for the corona virus for other causes such as terminal illness and other diseases underlying condition.
In the report, the city health department said that they revised the number of victims according to new counting guidelines and even included cases that were “most debatable” in the overall figures.
Reports reveal that, other than those reported initially 636 fatalities, others 756 the person who tested positive for the corona virus died in April. Their deaths were initially thought to be another cause, but for some people, “the virus is a catalyst for the main condition” and its deadly complications, the report states.
The authorities also added 169 death due to victims included people who tested negative for coronavirus, but for whom coronavirus was established as the main cause of death through post-mortem examination.
Moscow authorities said that, even with the revised mortality rate, the death rate of the Russian capital from Covid-19 remained lower than in other comparable large cities such as London and New York.
City officials as well as the Russian central government have warned the public that the figures for May will be higher.
“End of April culminates in coronavirus infection, and there are about 2-3 weeks between the peak of infection and death [spikes]”The report said, adding that the May figures would also be studied and released publicly.
Russian territory largely followed Moscow’s leadership in its response to the pandemic and also by counting cases, so that revising the counting method could lead to an increase in the number of deaths throughout the country.
Some areas have reported “double statistics,” releasing the number of deaths in patients who are positive for the corona virus which is officially considered to be from another cause in national figures.
Official at Dagestan, one of the worst-hit regions in Russia, previously said publicly that the overall death toll was far higher than that reflected in federal statistics.
