Lucinda Hiam, honorary research fellow at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and Danny Dorling, professor of geography at the University of Oxford, who carried out the study, said that neither flu nor winter weather seemed to be the main cause of the increase.<\/em><\/p>\n A subsequent analysis from the same authors, posted on 8 May as a rapid response<\/a> to the original article, shows that by the end of week 16 (ending 20 April) 20,215 more people have died than the average for the past five years.<\/em><\/p>\n The authors found it unlikely that this trend was a \u201cblip\u201d and urged the government and the House of Commons Health Select Committee to investigate the issue.<\/em><\/p>\n They wrote, \u201cThe latest Office for National Statistics data on weekly provisional deaths in England and Wales sadly provide little reassurance of this being a \u2018blip\u2019 as some have suggested. Yet, still, no action taken or even mention of a possible investigation has been heard from the Department of Health and Social Care. How many deaths will it take for the government to take note?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Last year an analysis by Michael Marmot, a leading public expert, found that the rate of increase in life expectancy in England had almost halved since 2010 and was close to stalling<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n In response to Hiam and Dorling\u2019s analysis, a spokesman for the Department of Health and Social Care said, \u201cWe keep all research in this area under review, but the \u2018age standardised mortality rate\u2019\u2014which has been broadly stable in recent years\u2014is considered a much more reliable measure, as this type of research doesn\u2019t take into account fluctuations in population numbers and the ageing population.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n But Dorling and Hiam strongly criticised the department\u2019s response, saying, \u201cThe age standardised rates should not be \u2018broadly stable\u2019\u2014they should be getting better as they have for almost all years since 1945, and are doing in all other European countries in recent years (2011 to 2015). \u201cThere is no other country in western Europe that has experienced a stalling in mortality improvement across the board as poor as that in the UK in recent years.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n They said that the Health Select Committee should carry out an investigation and \u201ccall ministers from the Department of Health and officials from Public Health England to answer their very specific questions without evasion.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n . . .<\/p>\n The British Medical Journal included a graph in their news report illustrating the continued elevated levels of overall (all age) mortality:<\/p>\n Excess Mortality in the first 16 weeks of 2018, England and Wales<\/p><\/div>\n read the full rapid response here<\/a> with all the graphs shown in this post embedded in a single PDF file<\/a>, fully referenced.<\/p>\n Another rapid response to the original March 14th 2018 BMJ article was posted by David Robinson and his colleagues<\/a> on 18 March 2018:<\/p>\n In this they revealed that “Death rate continues to rise for poorest infants in England and Wales<\/strong>” explaining that:<\/p>\n ” Last year we raised concern about the rise in infant mortality in England and Wales in a letter to the BMJ<\/a>.(1) The latest data released by the ONS this week<\/a> shows that infant mortality has risen for the second year running. In 2016 there were 2651 infant deaths, compared to 2578 and 2517 in the preceding two years. The statistically significant increase in infant mortality rate from 3.6 to 3.8 deaths per thousand live births over these two years (p-value = 0.037) is explained by the 5.3% increase in infant deaths, rather than by any change in the denominator which showed only negligible change. \u2026”<\/em><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.dannydorling.org\/wp-content\/files\/Mortality2018_16weeks-1024x846.png\")
<\/a>
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.dannydorling.org\/wp-content\/files\/neonatalaOctober2017.png\")