Coronavirus killing three times more people than flu and pneumonia combined

Coronavirus was linked to three times as many deaths than those caused by flu and pneumonia between January and August, the Office for National Statistics has said.

It looked at mortality rates for the three conditions and found there were 48,168 deaths linked to Covid-19 with the virus being the underlying cause of death in three times as many deaths.

There were 13,619 deaths due to pneumonia and 394 deaths due to influenza.

The ONS also looked back to when death records began being collected monthly and found Covid-19 remained more deadly than any flu and pneumonia seasons back to 1959.

Sarah Caul head of mortality analysis at the ONS said: “More than three times as many deaths were recorded between January and August this year where Covid-19 was the underlying cause compared to influenza and pneumonia.

“The mortality rate for Covid-19 is also significantly higher than influenza and pneumonia rates for both 2020 and the five-year average.

“Since 1959, which is when ONS monthly death records began, the number of deaths due to influenza and pneumonia in the first eight months of every year have been lower than the number of Covid-19 deaths seen, so far, in 2020.”