Estimates of casualties from the war in Ukraine have varied widely. Some of this is due to genuine difficulty counting the dead, but there are also strategic reasons to put out misleading death tolls.
A girl views the body of her father, who died of COVID-19, while mourners who can’t visit in person are onscreen.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images News via Getty Images
Health statisticians keep careful tabs on how many people die every week. Based on what’s happened in past years, they know what to expect – but 2020 death counts are surging beyond predictions.
The pandemic leaves its mark in the number of lives ended.
Ben Hasty/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images
Health statisticians keep careful tabs on how many people die every week. Based on what’s happened in past years, they know what to expect – but 2020 death counts are surging beyond predictions.
UK opposition leader, Keir Starmer, with a government graph showing an international comparison of COVID-19 death tolls.
UK Parliament/Jessica Taylor/PA Wire/PA Images
Most people believe the government was wrong to stop publishing international comparisons of COVID-19 death tolls.
President Donald Trump tosses paper towels into a crowd at Calvary Chapel in Guaynabo, Puerto Rico in October 2017 following Hurricane Maria. Trump congratulated Puerto Rico for escaping the higher death toll of “a real catastrophe like Katrina.” A new study suggests almost 3,000 people died in Puerto Rico.
(AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
As Trump fumes about the Hurricane Maria death toll, it’s clear that politics and political considerations often play an important role in how death toll estimates are communicated to the public.