MADISON, Wis. — On Sunday, President Donald Trump tweeted that the COVID-19 death toll is “far exaggerated” and “fake news.” There are still a lot of conspiracy theories surrounding how deaths due to COVID-19 are counted.
The number of cases and deaths of the China Virus is far exaggerated in the United States because of @CDCgov’s ridiculous method of determination compared to other countries, many of whom report, purposely, very inaccurately and low. “When in doubt, call it Covid.” Fake News!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 3, 2021
So News 3 Now asked Dr. Jeff Pothof, Chief Medical Officer at UW Health, how physicians determine if someone died of COVID-19.
He said often times there are multiple causes of death listed on a death certificate. The first, primary cause might be a heart attack or blood clot, but because COVID-19 caused that, it is also listed.
“You might have a COVID-19 patient who on their death certificate under cause of death it has two things, it’ll say ARDS (Acute respiratory distress syndrome) and COVID-19. And someone might say, ‘Look, it was the ARDS that killed them. Not the COVID-19. You just threw COVID-19 on there because you wanted to.’ Or some people say we get paid more or there’s some grand conspiracy across hundreds of thousands of physicians across the country. COVID-19 causes ARDS. That person never would’ve gotten ARDS if they didn’t have COVID,” said Pothof.
In Wisconsin, healthcare providers are required to report COVID-19 cases and deaths through the Wisconsin Electronic Disease Surveillance System (WEDSS). That is how the numbers get reported to the Wisconsin Department of Health Services and get added to the state’s death count.
Some might question how doctors know a patient wouldn’t have died of a heart attack or blood clot even without contracting COVID-19, but Pothof said doctors know if someone was at risk before catching the virus.
“If you essentially had zero risk for something, and we know that COVID-19 substantially increases your risk for something, and then suddenly you had that something happen, COVID-19 probably did that,” said Pothof. “If someone got hit by a train, I don’t think any of us would say ‘Well, it’s their obesity that killed them,’ right? It was the fact they got hit by a train that killed them. So it’s kind of similar when you say someone had high blood pressure, they died from that – not COVID. It just doesn’t hold much weight.”
As for the many conspiracy theories, Pothof said he can’t pay attention to them. He said all he can do is try to educate people about what’s really going on inside UW Health’s COVID Unit, even if it’s scary.
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