Household Survey Sees 100,000 Iraqi Deaths
A survey of deaths in Iraqi households estimates that as many as 100,000 more people may have died throughout the country in the 18 months since the U.S.-led invasion than would be expected based on the death rate before the war.
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The scientists who wrote the report concede that the data they based their projections on were of "limited precision," because the quality of the information depends on the accuracy of the household interviews used for the study. The interviewers were Iraqi, most of them doctors.Designed and conducted by researchers at Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University and the Al-Mustansiriya University in Baghdad, the study is being published Thursday on the Web site of The Lancet medical journal.
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Richard Peto, an expert on study methods who was not involved with the research, said the approach the scientists took is a reasonable one to investigate the Iraq death toll.
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The most common causes of death before the invasion of Iraq were heart attacks, strokes and other chronic diseases. However, after the invasion, violence was recorded as the primary cause of death and was mainly attributed to coalition forces with about 95 percent of those deaths caused by bombs or fire from helicopter gunships.Violent deaths defined as those brought about by the intentional act of others were reported in 15 of the 33 clusters. The chances of a violent death were 58 times higher after the invasion than before it, the researchers said.
Yes, this is only an estimate. But frankly it makes a lot more sense than the lowball figures we've had to use because the Coalition has made a point of not keeping track and sites like Iraq Body Count have been so careful to count only those casualties they could document.
So now am I allowed to curse George Bush in as many languages as I know without being accused of irrational Bush hatred?
Hatred of Bush is perfectly rational!
Why do you hate America?
You had me going there for a minute, Michael.
"Why do you hate America?" Assuming this is a real question and not a put on, it's not hating America. Actually it's not even 'hating' Bush so much as any number of other emotional and logical responses to someone who has created a record number of foul-ups in a 4 year period. Given the feeling of the majority of the people in almost every country in the world towards Bush and his entire misadministration, I do expect the hating of America to start soon enough if he is elected. People around the world were willing to give individual Americans a free pass because they believe the voters were had. If Bush is still around in January, the free pass will expire.
Michael would probably agree with everything you just said, and probably has stronger negative feelings about Bush than you and I do.
Pogge hates America because of their freedom....
:P
The Australian Defense Minister was quoted in response to this study. He said basically, So what -- Saddam killed 300,000.
I don't how he came up with that number, but its becoming a pretty grisly competition.
If he wants to make comparisons, fine. Saddam killed 300,000 in 24 years. The Coalition has killed 100,000 in a year and a half. The odds look pretty good for the Coalition to catch up.
None of which alters the fact that the blood of that 100,000 is on the Coalition's hands. All of the talk about precision bombing is bullshit. And the Australian Defense Minister is pathetic.
Pogge, the civilian deaths in Iraq, no matter what the number, are horrible to contemplate.
Having said that, the study you quote is deeply flawed. Fred Kaplan in Slate lays out why:
We estimate there were 98,000 extra deaths (95% CI 8000-194 000) during the post-war period.
Readers who are accustomed to perusing statistical documents know what the set of numbers in the parentheses means. For the other 99.9 percent of you, I'll spell it out in plain English—which, disturbingly, the study never does. It means that the authors are 95 percent confident that the war-caused deaths totaled some number between 8,000 and 194,000. (The number cited in plain language—98,000—is roughly at the halfway point in this absurdly vast range.)
This isn't an estimate. It's a dart board.
You'll want to read the whole article. I'm not an expert in statistics, but Kaplan's points seem valid to me.
The 100,000 extra dead figure could end up being correct. Or it could be low. Or it could be high. But right now, it's nothing more than a guess. 8K-194K is a huge range.
Damian:
Thanks. I'd already seen the Kaplan article and plan to blog it later. Kaplan's criticisms of the study are convincing. At the same time, the only other sources, like Iraq Body Count, are being so careful that it's difficult to credit the idea that they're really capturing everything.
We may never get an accurate count. How do you define 'civilian' in a conflict like this? Is the fourteen-year-old shot while carrying food to insurgents a civilian death? What about the woman who hides rebels in her basement and dies when a precision-guided bomb levels the whole house? What about that woman's adult children living with her?
War is not an environment where precise definitions find much application.