Deaths this year...

[Halftime Hope]

My church runs about 800-900 in attendance on a Sunday.  We have 1700+ on the active member rolls. 

In a normal year, we run between 12 - 18 deaths.  This year we've had 3 that are direct COVID deaths; none of those were in nursing homes, although we have had two cases in members who are in nursing home care. 

But here's the kicker; we've had 29 deaths. 

This has been a rough, rough year on people. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BlsdMama]

I was at Mayo last week and they have seen indirect Covid deaths - strokes, blood clots, etc. I do not believe we are able to accurately calculate deaths related to Covid. Holidays are rough for everyone who has lost someone. 😞 Glad to see 2020 go. 

[Carol in Cal.]

I lost a family member to Covid.

And I know personally two people who are still experiencing long lasting debilitating effects from having had it—one contracted it last Nov/Dec on a trip to Germany, and the other got it on a cruise in Feb/March right before the shutdown.  

I know *of* many other online friends with it, some of whom I have met briefly here and there—too many to count, but at least 20.

I do not want to get this illness.  Flat out.

[Mrs Tiggywinkle]

I have had several family members and friends die this year, none of it was Covid related. My grandfather died of a heart attack in January. The others have either been just plain old age or suicide.

[kokotg]

The AP just reported the other day that deaths are up 15% this year (after a slight drop in 2019)--the largest increase since 1918. https://apnews.com/article/us-coronavirus-deaths-top-3-million-e2bc856b6ec45563b84ee2e87ae8d5e7

Quote

The nation’s overall mortality rate fell a bit in 2019, due to reductions in heart disease and cancer deaths. And life expectancy inched up — by several weeks — for the second straight year, according to death certificate data released Tuesday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

But life expectancy for 2020 could end up dropping as much as three full years, said Robert Anderson of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

 

Edited December 24, 2020 by kokotg

[Katy]

I know several people in their 40’s who had blood clots in January & February. One died. They initially decided that it couldn’t be Covid because of the timing, but now they don’t know. 

[math teacher]

I know several who have died this year. My uncle and his wife died of Covid. A longtime friend and his mother died within days of each other. A friend lost her son to cardiac arrest-he was around 30. 

[JennyD]

2 hours ago, kokotg said:

The AP just reported the other day that deaths are up 15% this year (after a slight drop in 2019)--the largest increase since 1918. https://apnews.com/article/us-coronavirus-deaths-top-3-million-e2bc856b6ec45563b84ee2e87ae8d5e7

 

I am not surprised by this at all.  I have a whole list of condolence notes that I have to write.  Some deaths from covid, others from unrelated causes (cancer), others perhaps from covid or perhaps not (heart attacks), and then there were my two very elderly relatives sequestered all alone in nursing homes who decided that they'd had enough and just stopped eating.

It has been a terrible year.

 

 

 

[lulalu]

I haven't known anyone this year to die of COVID. Many who have been hospitalized and needed ventilators. But all of those have recovered even the elderly.

But I know many who have died this year from other things. It has felt like more deaths. Some were very expected because of age. But I know of 4 suicides, several accidents, one cancer because treatment was delayed due to the virus. 

It has been a hard year for sure. 

[kbutton]

My extensive extended family has had 12 or 13 deaths, and DH’s one. Four were Covid for sure. Some of the rest have a possibility of being Covid but are unlikely to have been. One death was as much with Covid as from Covid, and I generally don’t give that category much credence (caught Covid in hospice for dementia).

No one is telling us much of what’s going on at church to know of deaths, but I did hear of two. One from cancer and one from a freak accident (pickup truck drove into the woman’s home).

There are definitely high cases and high deaths locally, but our family is not local. 

[mommyoffive]

I am so sorry for everyone who is dealing with losing someone this year.   2020 has been such a hard year.  It is really hard for me to bear all the death and sad news at this point.   I am praying 2021 is a better year. 

[Spryte]

7 hours ago, Carol in Cal. said:

I lost a family member to Covid.

And I know personally two people who are still experiencing long lasting debilitating effects from having had it—one contracted it last Nov/Dec on a trip to Germany, and the other got it on a cruise in Feb/March right before the shutdown.  

I know *of* many other online friends with it, some of whom I have met briefly here and there—too many to count, but at least 20.

I do not want to get this illness.  Flat out.

I am so, so sorry for your loss.

And for your friends who are still suffering.  It’s awful.  We have long-hauler friends, too, and I feel so helpless as to how to help them.  

Something else in your post leaped off the page at me, though.  Your friend caught it last Nov/Dec in Germany?  Oh my goodness.  Was it there, in Germany, in Dec?  ...my DH travels to Germany frequently, and when he came home last Dec ... he was ill, and we all caught it.  I have posted before that we were all terribly ill for a good six weeks or more, and wondered if it might have been Covid.  We will never know.  I honestly feared for one kid, it was a nightmare. We obviously didn’t get tested.  I never, never want to be that sick again.  It was horrible.  Then again, DH has also brought home various European flu strains that were just nightmare-ish, so it might have just been some other illness. I was just surprised to see you mentioned the same time period DH was there multiple times.  Yikes.

We have lost acquaintances, and have seen so many friends suffer through losses of family members, and have watched friends struggle with this terrible illness. It’s truly something we want to avoid.

Wishing all a healthy holiday and new year - can’t wait to see the end of 2020.

[Carol in Cal.]

59 minutes ago, Spryte said:

I am so, so sorry for your loss.

And for your friends who are still suffering.  It’s awful.  We have long-hauler friends, too, and I feel so helpless as to how to help them.  

Something else in your post leaped off the page at me, though.  Your friend caught it last Nov/Dec in Germany?  Oh my goodness.  Was it there, in Germany, in Dec?  ...my DH travels to Germany frequently, and when he came home last Dec ... he was ill, and we all caught it.  I have posted before that we were all terribly ill for a good six weeks or more, and wondered if it might have been Covid.  We will never know.  I honestly feared for one kid, it was a nightmare. We obviously didn’t get tested.  I never, never want to be that sick again.  It was horrible.  Then again, DH has also brought home various European flu strains that were just nightmare-ish, so it might have just been some other illness. I was just surprised to see you mentioned the same time period DH was there multiple times.  Yikes.

We have lost acquaintances, and have seen so many friends suffer through losses of family members, and have watched friends struggle with this terrible illness. It’s truly something we want to avoid.

Wishing all a healthy holiday and new year - can’t wait to see the end of 2020.

Yes, it was in Germany, Italy, and China by Dec.  And it seems like it was in the US but at very low levels.

I’m so glad you are OK now.  I wonder whether you could get tested for antibodies?  

[Spryte]

35 minutes ago, Carol in Cal. said:

Yes, it was in Germany, Italy, and China by Dec.  And it seems like it was in the US but at very low levels.

I’m so glad you are OK now.  I wonder whether you could get tested for antibodies?  

It may be a bit late for that now, but oh my, I never want to be so sick or see our kids that sick again!  It’s made us be super cautious, because if that wasn’t Covid, goodness, I can’t imagine how awful it must be.  I guess the upside is that we didn’t infect my elderly mom, because she was in rehab the whole time.  Perfect timing. Whew.

DH was in Munich in early Dec, meeting with people from Italy, France, and Norway.  Makes one wonder.

I hope your friends are improving.  Wishing we could do something for all the long-haulers.  

[Carol in Cal.]

3 minutes ago, Spryte said:

It may be a bit late for that now, but oh my, I never want to be so sick or see our kids that sick again!  It’s made us be super cautious, because if that wasn’t Covid, goodness, I can’t imagine how awful it must be.  I guess the upside is that we didn’t infect my elderly mom, because she was in rehab the whole time.  Perfect timing. Whew.

DH was in Munich in early Dec, meeting with people from Italy, France, and Norway.  Makes one wonder.

I hope your friends are improving.  Wishing we could do something for all the long-haulers.  

My friends that got it in Germany were deathly ill.  The husband recovered after about 3 weeks.  The wife was hospitalized for almost that long, and then came out of the hospital on oxygen.  She didn’t set foot outside of her house for 6 months after that, and when she finally took her first walk outside, her husband drove her to the top of a little hill near their house so that she could walk down hill, and he followed her in the car in case she got short of breath or too weak to walk that two blocks back to their house.  It was horrendous.

[TravelingChris]

17 hours ago, BlsdMama said:

I was at Mayo last week and they have seen indirect Covid deaths - strokes, blood clots, etc. I do not believe we are able to accurately calculate deaths related to Covid. Holidays are rough for everyone who has lost someone. 😞 Glad to see 2020 go. 

I know they are predicting a rise in deaths of cancer in the future and currently even there are heart attacks, other infections, and other deaths being caused by less medical availability to non COVID cases on the provider end and less willingness by people to go to a doctor or facility for anything because of fright of COVID>