Direct and indirect impacts of COVID-19 on excess deaths and morbidity: Executive summary (15 July 2020)

Summary

The COVID-19 pandemic will impact the health of many people in England and unfortunately many people will lose their lives. This paper from the Department of Health and Social Care, Office for National Statistics, Government Actuary’s Department and Home Office, provides a summary of research and analysis, discussing and estimating the health impacts (both excess deaths and morbidity) from the pandemic.

Content

Impacts of the pandemic may be direct from COVID-19 or may be indirect from changes to the healthcare system or lockdown measures.

The paper conceptualises harm to health using the following four categories:

• A. Health impacts from contracting COVID-19 (A)
• B. Health outcomes for COVID-19 worsened because of lack of NHS critical care capacity (B)
• C. Health impacts from changes to health and social care made in order to respond to COVID19, such as changes to emergency care (C1), changes to adult social care (C2), changes to elective care (C3) and changes to primary and community care (C4).
• D. Health impacts from factors affecting the wider population, both from social distancing measures (D1) and the economic impacts increasing deprivation (D2).

The results are briefly discussed in the section below; summary tables of the mortality and morbidity impacts can also be found below.