Coronavirus: Robin Swann pledges more clarity on deaths

Health Minister Robin Swann said he is committed to transparency on statistics on coronavirus-related deaths in Northern Ireland.

Mr Swann said he wanted to explore the possibility of the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (Nisra) reporting deaths more frequently.

Nisra's weekly figures cover all deaths where coronavirus has been recorded on the death certificate.

There is also a daily report released by the Department of Health.

It covers all deaths recorded by health trusts where there had been a laboratory confirmed positive Covid-19 test within 28 days of death. These are mainly hospital deaths, but about 25% are thought to be in care homes.

Mr Swann accepted the statistical analysis was not straightforward.

"It is clear that there will be some overlap between the community deaths included in the published daily figures and the weekly Nisra bulletin," he said.

"I fully accept this is complicated. Statistics help us to track the virus and keep the public informed. But the well-established process for death registration was not designed for use in a pandemic of this nature."

'Very challenging'

Mr Swann stressed that there was a time lag associated with completion of registration of deaths in the community.

"It can take a number of days for the necessary documentation to be completed and fully registered. So this makes it very challenging if not impossible to provide daily reports that are fully up to date.

"I am committed to doing all I can to get as much information into the public domain as possible."