CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – On Tuesday night, more than 536,000 people died of COVID-19 in the United States, including more than 5,600 Iowa residents.
Several experts have told our Investigative Unit KCRG-TV9 i9 that these numbers are likely to be higher than reported.
That’s because many Iowa residents are dying of symptoms similar to those of COVID-19 and these cases are not necessarily being investigated. Death certificates I found show Iowans dying from respiratory problems due to an underlying cause of pneumonia. County officials also told us about a similar trend.
Dr. James Gill, who is the chief coroner in Connecticut, said these are cases that need to be investigated because there is likely to be another illness causing pneumonia.
“Pneumonia alone raises some questions,” said Gill. “Well, ‘why did this person get pneumonia’ and that’s the question you have to ask.”
Gill said pneumonia deaths can be caused by a large number of underlying conditions, including dementia, homicide or even COVID-19.
“I mean, we had deaths where someone was certified as pneumonia and you examine and find out, well, they got pneumonia because they are quadriplegic because they were shot two years ago,” said Gill. “And then the gunshot wound is actually the basic cause of death and if you don’t research that underlying reason for the cause of death, you’re going to miss deaths like that.”
Gill also said that at the beginning of the pandemic, Connecticut was seeing many death certificates with certified pneumonia as the original cause, then it was reclassified as COVID-19 deaths.
“We went to funeral homes and cleaned the body in the funeral home to see if they were infected with COVID or not,” said Gill. “And we found dozens of positive people with COVID-19 and higher certified as COVID-19 deaths. Even if the original death certificate did not list COVID-19 as the cause of death. “
In Iowa, coroners do not investigate all deaths. State law only requires that they investigate deaths in the public interest, such as homicides or contagious diseases. This does not include pneumonia or breathing problems. Gill said the law cuffs coroners, in a way, because they often depend on doctors and staff to report cases to them.
Then there are the deaths of COVID-19 that even coroners did not know how to investigate.
Dr. Donald Linder, who is the medical examiner for Linn County, said that sometimes, when people died of COVID-19, these cases were not initially reported in his office.
“Well, in the first months of the pandemic, we learned first, in the second or third hand that that person had COVID,” said Linder. “Like, admit that you should tell us.”
Linder said that and probably the lack of testing means that the number of deaths reported due to COVID-19 is less than the actual number of deaths in the state.
“There is no doubt that the deaths were underreported or escaped through the cracks,” said Linder.
Data from the Iowa Department of Public Health show that deaths increased in 2020 and 2021.
The state has had trouble reporting COVID-19-related deaths in the past. In November, 19 learned that the Iowa data portal for COVID-19 reported the number of deaths in some counties in the state. At the time, the Appanoose County Health Department reported 27 deaths in the county, but the state’s data portal reported only 9 deaths.
A similar discrepancy occurred in Linn County. The Linn County Department of Public Health reported 183 deaths on Wednesday. The state data portal recorded 162 deaths.
The discrepancy was occurring because the state required a positive CRP test at the time and meant that those who died of the virus and did not have a positive CRP test are not counted as deaths. This was changed in December and allows medical professionals to determine whether a death is related to the virus.
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