What is the infection fatality rate of Covid 19?
Erika Whittome made this Official Information request to Ministry of Health
Response to this request is long overdue. By law Ministry of Health should have responded by now (details and exceptions). The requester can complain to the Ombudsman.
From: Erika Whittome
Dear Ministry of Health,
What is the infection fatality rate and the case fatality rate (CFR) for Covid-19?
For example:
Legionnaires' disease has a CFR of about 15%.
The Bubonic plague in Europe resulted in the death of 30% to 90% of those infected
Ebola virus disease, has a CFR as high as 90%.
Yours faithfully,
Erika Whittome
From: OIA Requests
Kia ora Erika
Thank you for your request for official information. The reference number
for your request is: H2023032538
As required under the Official Information Act 1982, Manatū Hauora will
endeavour to respond to your request no later than 20 working days after
the day your request was received. If you'd like to calculate the
timeframe, you can use the Ombudsman's online calculator
here: [1]http://www.ombudsman.parliament.nz/
If you have any queries, please feel free to contact the OIA Services Team
on [2][email address]. If any additional factors come to light which
are relevant to your request, please do not hesitate to contact us so that
these can be taken into account.
Under section 28(3) of the Act you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [3][email address] or by calling 0800
802 602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[4]inistry of Health information releases
U[5]nite against COVID-19
------------------- Original Message
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From: OIA Requests
Tēnā koe Erika
Please find attached a response to your request for official information.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[1]inistry of Health information releases
U[2]nite against COVID-19
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References
Visible links
1. https://www.health.govt.nz/about-ministr...
2. https://covid19.govt.nz/
From: Erika Whittome
Dear OIA Requests,
So your response says 107 deaths for 100,000 people. The number 107 divided by 100,000 is 0.00107. Multiplying by 100 gives a percentage which is 0.1 percent.
Correct me if I am wrong here, but you are reporting that the infection fatality rate is 0.1% for Covid-19.
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
From: OIA Requests
Kia ora Erika
The Infection Fatality Rate (IFR) is not estimated to be 0.1%. As outlined
in the response, the Case Fatality Rate (CFR) is approximately 0.1%, but
the IFR is unknown. The IFR is complex to estimate and to help give
context to some of the complexity, the literature references given in the
original response may be helpful to you.
Under section 28(3) of the Act you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [1][email address] or by calling 0800
802 602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[2]inistry of Health information releases
U[3]nite against COVID-19
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Erika Whittome <[FOI #24498 email]>
Sent: Thursday, 16 November 2023 21:11
To: OIA Requests <[email address]>
Subject: Re: Response to your request for official information ref:
H2023032538 CRM:0120240
Dear OIA Requests,
So your response says 107 deaths for 100,000 people. The number 107
divided by 100,000 is 0.00107. Multiplying by 100 gives a percentage which
is 0.1 percent.
Correct me if I am wrong here, but you are reporting that the infection
fatality rate is 0.1% for Covid-19.
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
show quoted sections
From: Erika Whittome
Dear OIA Requests,
This is a basic question to which the Ministry Of Health is obfuscating the answer. The Ministry of Health has not answered the straightforward questions for a common benchmark for a disease - its infection fatality rate.
What are the number of people who have been infected? And of those infected, how many have died for this particular disease?
Would the Ministry kindly answer the question under the Official Information Act ?
I would like to remind you of Section 32B of the Official Information Act 1982 that would not involve any legals costs for a challenge in the High Court:
Right of review
(1)Where—
(a)a recommendation is made under section 30(1) in respect of a request made under section 12; and
(b)an Order in Council is made under section 32 in respect of that recommendation,—
the person who made that request may apply to the High Court for a review of the making of that Order in Council.
(2)An application under subsection (1) may be made on the ground that the Order in Council was beyond the powers conferred by sections 32 and 32A or was otherwise wrong in law.
(3)On an application under subsection (1), the High Court may—
(a)make an order confirming that the Order in Council was validly made; or
(b)make an order declaring that the making of the Order in Council was beyond the powers conferred by sections 32 and 32A or was otherwise wrong in law.
(4)Unless the High Court is satisfied that an application brought under subsection (1) has not been reasonably or properly brought, it shall, in determining the application and irrespective of the result of the application, order that the costs of the applicant on a solicitor and client basis shall be paid by the Crown, and such costs shall be paid out of money appropriated by Parliament for the purpose.
https://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/publ...
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
From: OIA Requests
Kia ora Erika
Thank you for your request for official information. The reference number
for your request is: H2023033115
As required under the Official Information Act 1982, Manatū Hauora will
endeavour to respond to your request no later than 20 working days after
the day your request was received. If you'd like to calculate the
timeframe, you can use the Ombudsman's online calculator
here: [1]http://www.ombudsman.parliament.nz/
If you have any queries, please feel free to contact the OIA Services Team
on [2][email address]. If any additional factors come to light which
are relevant to your request, please do not hesitate to contact us so that
these can be taken into account.
Under section 28(3) of the Act you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [3][email address] or by calling 0800
802 602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[4]inistry of Health information releases
show quoted sections
From: OIA Requests
Kia ora Erika
Thank you for your follow-up request for official information, received on
21 November 2023. You requested:
Dear OIA Requests,
This is a basic question to which the Ministry Of Health is obfuscating
the answer. The Ministry of Health has not answered the straightforward
questions for a common benchmark for a disease - its infection fatality
rate.
What are the number of people who have been infected? And of those
infected, how many have died for this particular disease?
Would the Ministry kindly answer the question under the Official
Information Act ?
As explained in the response you received on 16 November 2023, the number
of people infected (as opposed to the number of reported cases) is
unknown, and can only be estimated. Therefore, it is not possible to know
the percentage of those who have been infected, who have died (i.e. the
infection fatality rate).
However, the number of cases that have been reported, and the case
fatality rate is known. It is important to emphasise that the number of
reported cases is not the same as the number of infections.
The total number of cases and deaths is provided at:
[1]www.tewhatuora.govt.nz/our-health-system/data-and-statistics/covid-19-data/covid-19-current-cases/
While the Act allows New Zealanders to ask Ministers and government
agencies for information, it is not a vehicle to engage in a debate with
agencies about the Government’s response to the global COVID-19
pandemic. The Act does not support requests where an opinion, comment,
argument, or hypothetical statement is put to the Ministry for response,
couched as a request for information. Moreover, please be advised that
using the Act in this manner could be construed as vexatious and result in
such requests being refused under section 18(h) of the Act.
Under section 28(3) of the Act, you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [email address] or by calling 0800 802
602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[2]inistry of Health information releases
U[3]nite against COVID-19
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: OIA Requests <[email address]>
Sent: Tuesday, 21 November 2023 10:28
To: Erika Whittome <[FOI #24498 email]>
Subject: Acknowledgement of your request for official information ref:
H2023033115 CRM:0261955
Kia ora Erika
Thank you for your request for official information. The reference number
for your request is: H2023033115
As required under the Official Information Act 1982, Manatū Hauora will
endeavour to respond to your request no later than 20 working days after
the day your request was received. If you'd like to calculate the
timeframe, you can use the Ombudsman's online calculator
here: [4]http://www.ombudsman.parliament.nz/
If you have any queries, please feel free to contact the OIA Services Team
on [5][email address]. If any additional factors come to light which
are relevant to your request, please do not hesitate to contact us so that
these can be taken into account.
Under section 28(3) of the Act you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [6][email address] or by calling 0800
802 602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[7]inistry of Health information releases
show quoted sections
From: Erika Whittome
Dear OIA Requests,
You rsponse says :
"From 1 January to 26 August 2022, the case fatality risk (CFR); that is the proportion of
individuals who die among those who have been diagnosed for COVID-19 was 107.0 per
100,000 reported cases"
In the context of your answer, Would you kindly define "risk" ?
ie 107 in 100,000 : are you saying that is the number of people who are at risk OF DYING, if they contract covid-19?
I actually did not ask for risk information. I asked for a rate, ie a numerator over a divisor that is multiplied by a hundred for a percentage.
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
From: OIA Requests
Kia ora Erika
Thank you for your request for official information. The reference number
for your request is: H2023033153
As required under the Official Information Act 1982, Manatū Hauora will
endeavour to respond to your request no later than 20 working days after
the day your request was received. If you'd like to calculate the
timeframe, you can use the Ombudsman's online calculator
here: [1]http://www.ombudsman.parliament.nz/
If you have any queries, please feel free to contact the OIA Services Team
on [2][email address]. If any additional factors come to light which
are relevant to your request, please do not hesitate to contact us so that
these can be taken into account.
Under section 28(3) of the Act you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [3][email address] or by calling 0800
802 602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[4]inistry of Health information releases
From: Erika Whittome [5][FOI #24498 email]
Sent: Wednesday, 22 November 2023 1:42 pm
To: OIA Requests [6][email address]
Subject: Re: Your request for official information ref: H2023033115
CRM:0261955
Dear OIA Requests,
You rsponse says :
"From 1 January to 26 August 2022, the case fatality risk (CFR); that is
the proportion of individuals who die among those who have been diagnosed
for COVID-19 was 107.0 per
100,000 reported cases"
In the context of your answer, Would you kindly define "risk" ?
ie 107 in 100,000 : are you saying that is the number of people who are at
risk OF DYING, if they contract covid-19?
I actually did not ask for risk information. I asked for a rate, ie a
numerator over a divisor that is multiplied by a hundred for a percentage.
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
show quoted sections
M Bell left an annotation ()
Seems to be a lot of equivocating of words here risk, rate, case, infection etc. It is astounding that they are claiming that they do not know the infection fatality rate/risk. Hard to believe they do not have the IFR data.
As to what they have said, and assuming "risk" and "rate" are interchangeable...
They say that the CFR is 0.107%, and they say that the mortality rate is 0.033%. They also say that the IFR will be somewhere in between the CFR and the mortality rate, and that the international estimate of IFR is 0.051%.
For argument sake lets say that there were 3 million actual infections of C19 and infection fatality rate at 0.051% would mean some 1530 dead. Up to 14/8/23 the official number was 2034 deaths.
Hence it could be that the CFR is actually somewhere around that 0.051% international estimate.
From: OIA Requests
Kia ora Erika
As referred to in the previous response, the case fatality risk is the
number of COVID-19 deaths divided by the total number of people who
reported having covid. As you say, this can be multiplied by 100 to get a
percentage. This is often also referred to as a rate.
The denominator is not the number who 'contract covid' as mentioned in
your question. The CFR refers to the number of people who reported having
COVID-19 or a positive test -- there are people who have COVID-19 or have
a positive test who do not report
For a discussion of the differences between rates, risks, CFR and IFR
please refer to literature sources such as
[1]https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus.
We now consider this matter and closed and have nothing further to add.
Under section 28(3) of the Act, you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [2][email address] or by calling 0800
802 602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[3]inistry of Health information releases
U[4]nite against COVID-19
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: OIA Requests <[email address]>
Sent: Wednesday, 22 November 2023 15:20
To: Erika Whittome <[FOI #24498 email]>
Subject: Acknowledgement of your request for official information ref:
H2023033153 CRM:0261965
Kia ora Erika
Thank you for your request for official information. The reference number
for your request is: H2023033153
As required under the Official Information Act 1982, Manatū Hauora will
endeavour to respond to your request no later than 20 working days after
the day your request was received. If you'd like to calculate the
timeframe, you can use the Ombudsman's online calculator
here: [5]http://www.ombudsman.parliament.nz/
If you have any queries, please feel free to contact the OIA Services Team
on [6][email address]. If any additional factors come to light which
are relevant to your request, please do not hesitate to contact us so that
these can be taken into account.
Under section 28(3) of the Act you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [7][email address] or by calling 0800
802 602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[8]inistry of Health information releases
From: Erika Whittome [9][FOI #24498 email]
Sent: Wednesday, 22 November 2023 1:42 pm
To: OIA Requests [10][email address]
Subject: Re: Your request for official information ref: H2023033115
CRM:0261955
Dear OIA Requests,
You rsponse says :
"From 1 January to 26 August 2022, the case fatality risk (CFR); that is
the proportion of individuals who die among those who have been diagnosed
for COVID-19 was 107.0 per
100,000 reported cases"
In the context of your answer, Would you kindly define "risk" ?
ie 107 in 100,000 : are you saying that is the number of people who are at
risk OF DYING, if they contract covid-19?
I actually did not ask for risk information. I asked for a rate, ie a
numerator over a divisor that is multiplied by a hundred for a percentage.
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
show quoted sections
From: Erika Whittome
Dear OIA Requests,
You have obfuscated the answer to a simple question
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
From: OIA Requests
Kia ora Erika
Under section 28(3) of the Act, you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [1][email address] or by calling 0800
802 602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[2]inistry of Health information releases
U[3]nite against COVID-19
show quoted sections
From: OIA Requests <[email address]>
Sent: Wednesday, 22 November 2023 15:20
To: Erika Whittome <[FOI #24498 email]>
Subject: Acknowledgement of your request for official information ref:
H2023033153 CRM:0261965
Kia ora Erika
Thank you for your request for official information. The reference number
for your request is: H2023033153
As required under the Official Information Act 1982, Manatū Hauora will
endeavour to respond to your request no later than 20 working days after
the day your request was received. If you'd like to calculate the
timeframe, you can use the Ombudsman's online calculator
here: [5]https://aus01.safelinks.protection.outlo...
If you have any queries, please feel free to contact the OIA Services
Team
on [6][email address]. If any additional factors come to light which
are relevant to your request, please do not hesitate to contact us so
that
these can be taken into account.
Under section 28(3) of the Act you have the right to ask the Ombudsman to
review any decisions made under this request. The Ombudsman may be
contacted by email at: [7][email address] or by calling 0800
802 602.
Ngā mihi
OIA Services Team
Manatū Hauora | Ministry of Health
M[8]inistry of Health information releases
From: Erika Whittome [9][FOI #24498 email]
Sent: Wednesday, 22 November 2023 1:42 pm
To: OIA Requests [10][email address]
Subject: Re: Your request for official information ref: H2023033115
CRM:0261955
Dear OIA Requests,
You rsponse says :
"From 1 January to 26 August 2022, the case fatality risk (CFR); that is
the proportion of individuals who die among those who have been diagnosed
for COVID-19 was 107.0 per
100,000 reported cases"
In the context of your answer, Would you kindly define "risk" ?
ie 107 in 100,000 : are you saying that is the number of people who are
at
risk OF DYING, if they contract covid-19?
I actually did not ask for risk information. I asked for a rate, ie a
numerator over a divisor that is multiplied by a hundred for a
percentage.
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
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References
Visible links
1. mailto:[email address]
2. https://www.health.govt.nz/about-ministr...
3. https://covid19.govt.nz/
4. https://fyi.org.nz/help/officers
From: Erika Whittome
Dear Ministry of Health
It has come to my attention that wikipedia is publishing the infection fatality rate. The "people's encyclopaedia" seems to be able to calculate this figure based on data from Te Whatu Ora which I will copy and paste for you:
COVID-19 pandemic in New Zealand
Disease COVID-19
Virus strain SARS-CoV-2
Location New Zealand
First outbreak Wuhan, Hubei, China
Index case Auckland, Auckland Region
Arrival date 28 February 2020
(4 years, 3 weeks and 1 day ago)
Confirmed cases 2,240,441[1] (total)
Active cases 12,799[1]
Suspected cases‡ 60,255[1] (total)
Recovered 2,283,778[1]
Deaths 2,716[1]
*Fatality rate 0.121%*
Footnote [1] https://www.tewhatuora.govt.nz/our-healt...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_p...
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
Athina Andonatou left an annotation ()
Thank you Ericka, may they appreciate you helping them do their job in telling the truth :-)
From: Erika Whittome
Dear OIA Requests,
I have lodged a complaint to the Ombudsman regarding this simple information not being supplied
Yours sincerely,
Erika Whittome
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- Download a zip file of all correspondence
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Athina Andonatou left an annotation ()
Thank you Erika for the questions you ask. I wonder if their statement of "Please note that in Aotearoa New Zealand, not all diagnoses may have been counted due to self-reporting of rapid antigen test results. This would mean that the true CFR may be somewhat lower than reported" also applies to the reporting of adverse effects experienced
Link to this