The Centre has rejected reports based on a "yet-to be peer-reviewed" study which claimed that at least 2.7 to 3.3 million COVID-19 deaths happened in India during the two waves, and termed it "totally fallacious".
It claimed that the government has been transparent in its approach to COVID-19 data management and ensured that a “robust system” of recording COVID-19 related deaths was in place in the country.
In a statement issued on July 27, the Union Health Ministry said that “there have been some media reports, based on a yet-to be peer-reviewed study which was uploaded on MedRxiv recently, alleging that at least 2.7 to 3.3 million COVID-19 deaths happened during the two waves of COVID-19 in India, quoting three different databases ‘pointing towards at least 27 percent excess mortality over a year.’”
The report further "concludes" that India's COVID-19 death rate may be about 7-8 times higher than the officially reported toll and claims that "most of these additional deaths are likely to have been due to COVID-19", the ministry said in the statement.
"Such misinformed reports are totally fallacious," the ministry said.
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All states and Union territories have been entrusted with the responsibility to update the data on a continuous basis, it said in the statement.
"In addition to this reporting by states/UTs, the robustness of statute-based Civil Registration System (CRS) ensures all the births and deaths in the country get registered. The CRS follows a process of data collection, cleaning, collating and publishing the numbers, which although is a long drawn process, but ensures no deaths are missed out. Because of the expanse and the amplitude of the activity, the numbers are usually published the next year," the statement said.
Also read: Mumbai reports 5 COVID-19 deaths, lowest since March 16, 2021
The ministry further said that it has been repeatedly advising states and UTs about recording of deaths in accordance with laid down guidelines. States have been advised to conduct thorough audits in their hospitals and report any cases or deaths that could have been missed with a district and date-wise details to guide data-driven decision making, it said.
Also read | Centre asks states for data on oxygen shortage deaths during second wave of COVID-19
“It is a well-known fact that there shall always be some differences in mortality recorded during a profound and prolonged public health crisis such as COVID-19 pandemic. Well conducted research studies on mortalities are usually done after the event when data on mortalities are available from reliable sources. The methodologies for such studies are well established, the data sources are defined as also the valid assumptions for computing mortality,” the statement added.
India has reported 4.21 lakh COVID-19 deaths so far, according to health ministry data updated on July 27.
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