COVID-19 Claimed 90,000 Lives In Belarus, Not 7,000 As Authorities Say
- 21.01.2025, 20:01
Shocking statistics.
According to Belstat, since 2014, an average of about 120,000 people have died in Belarus per year — an average of about 10,000 people per month. Nasha Niva writes that official statistics disappeared from open sources since the beginning of the COVID-19 epidemic.
Cyber Partisans managed to obtain databases on all deceased citizens of Belarus. This allowed us to estimate the real mortality statistics from 2018 to 2023.
These data show that during the pandemic from 2020 to 2022, excess mortality amounted to more than 90,000 people. These losses could not have come from anything other than COVID-19.
Mortality began to rise in March 2020, when the Belarusian authorities still completely denied the existence of a threat, and grew until June.
After that, the summer heat brought down the wave of infection. However, since the fall, growth has resumed.
The highest death rate in 2020 was observed in December: 18,437 cases, or 8,000 more than usual this month.
The year 2021 was absolutely catastrophic when the regime of Aliaksandr Lukashenka had already defeated the people and was no longer afraid of protests. This coincided with the moment when vaccination had not yet reached the entire population. The most severe were October (22,162 deaths) and November (20,063 deaths). At that time, 10,000-12,000 more people died every month than usual.
Only in April 2022, when vaccination covered the majority of the population, and people almost all got sick, the mortality rates returned to the "pre-COVID" level.
According to the Ministry of Health, during the entire period of the spread of infection (from March 2020 to July 2022, no newer data were published), 7,118 patients with COVID-19 died. However, the Cyber Partisans found that the coronavirus infection as the cause of death is listed in the documents in 22,759 cases — that is, more than three times more than in the number of victims of COVID-19 officially announced by the authorities.
So, despite the pressure of the authorities, many doctors on the ground honestly recorded the real cause of death, but the Lukashenka Administration deliberately falsified the data that was voiced. The administration was then headed by Ihar Siarheenka, now head of the "tent" [the House of Representatives - Ed.].
Official statistics did not take into account the deaths of patients from complications of various diseases caused by the coronavirus. In such cases, COVID-19 was not noted on death certificates, but the underlying disease was recorded.
Cyber Partisan's calculations do not differ from the results of a study published earlier in the scientific journal The Lancet, based on mortality data that the UN received from the Belarusian authorities. Scientists have calculated that the excess mortality in our country from January 1, 2020 to December 31, 2021 exceeded 85,600 people. At that time, the excess mortality for January-March 2022 was still unknown.
Aliaksandr Lukashenka argued that the authorities had chosen the right strategy in the fight against the coronavirus. “This once again shows that the health care system works under strict control and pressure,” he told Health Minister Pinevich in 2022.
In the comparable population of the Czech Republic (10.5 million people), the excess mortality rate for 2020—2021 was 49,100 people, or almost half that of Belarus.
In neighboring Latvia with a population of 1 million 800,000 people, the excess mortality rate was 12,400 people. And in Lithuania, where the population is 2 million 700,000 people, this figure was at the level of 20,000 people.
In 38-million Poland, excess mortality reached 214,000 people.
In Ukraine, the excess mortality from covid was 181,000 people. Until February 24, 2022, 43.5 million people lived in Ukraine. Thus, Ukraine coped with the coronavirus twice as well as Belarus.
In all the countries mentioned above: the Czech Republic, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Ukraine, unlike Belarus, the authorities did not deny the danger of covid and took measures aimed at limiting interpersonal contacts in closed premises for the period until there were no vaccines against covid.
In terms of 100,000 people, Belarus has the highest excess mortality rate from covid of all the countries listed above.
If we compare it with Lithuania and Latvia, it turns out that about 35,000 more people died in Belarus than could have been if the COVID-19 policy had been different. If we compare it with the Czech Republic, it is even 40,000 more.