India on Saturday refuted a report by The Economist which claimed that the country’s toll due to Covid-19 could be “five-to-seven times” h...
India on Saturday refuted a report by The Economist which claimed that the country’s toll due to Covid-19 could be “five-to-seven times” higher than the official number. The Union health ministry said said that the article “is without any basis and seems to be misinformed”.
“The unsound analysis of the said article is based on extrapolation of data without any epidemiological evidence,” the ministry said in a release.
In an article published in The Economist, the magazine referred to a research by Christopher Leffler of the Virginia Commonwealth University, to suggest that India’s actual toll could be more than 20 lakh. As of Saturday, India’s official toll is 3,67,081.
The health ministry, in its release, said that an internet search of research studies in scientific database did not locate Leffler’s study and that the detailed methodology of this study has not been provided by The Economist.
However, even as the release claimed that it could not find the research on the database, Research Gate, Leffler himself tweeted a link to his study that was available on the platform.
Updated version of article cited by The Economist: #ExcessMortality suggests Covid-19 fatalities of 2 million in India. https://t.co/0izncPZTYO https://t.co/xitB1Cp0Px
— Chris Leffler (@ChrisLefflerMD) June 12, 2021
The health ministry, however, raised further doubts on the veracity of the article, pointing out that it relies upon studies done by psephology groups,...
