Emerg Infect Dis. Deaths Associated with Influenza Pandemic of 1918?19, Japan

[Giuseppe]

[Source: Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal, full text: (LINK). Abstract, edited.]

Volume 19, Number 4?April 2013

Research

Deaths Associated with Influenza Pandemic of 1918?19, Japan


Siddharth Chandra

Author affiliation: Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA



Abstract

Current estimates of deaths from the influenza pandemic of 1918?19 in Japan are based on vital records and range from 257,000 to 481,000. The resulting crude death rate range of 0.45%?0.78% is considerably lower than parallel and conservative worldwide estimates of 1.66%?2.77%. Because the accuracy of vital registration records for early 20th century Asia is questionable, to calculate the percentage of the population who died from the pandemic, we used alternative prefecture-level population count data for Japan in combination with estimation methods for panel data that were not available to earlier demographers. Our population loss estimates of 1.97?2.02 million deaths are appreciably higher than the standing estimates, and they yield a crude rate of population loss of 3.62%?3.71%. This rate resolves a major puzzle about the pandemic by indicating that the experience of Japan was similar to that of other parts of Asia.

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[gsgs]

Re: Emerg Infect Dis. Deaths Associated with Influenza Pandemic of 1918?19, Japan

my summary:
~1.7M (+-0.3M) estimated Japanese deaths in 1918


they don't mention the age-distribution :-(
from the difference in age-distribution in the data from
1920 vs 1898-1903-1908-1913-1918
you should also be able to estimate the deaths in 1918


B.R.Mitchell in international historical statistics gives the population of
Japan by sex and agegroups in thousand as:

agegr,1920M,1920F,1930M,1930F,1940M,1940F
00-04,3713,3665,
05-09,3433,3355,
10-14,3057,2980,
15-19,2721,2642,
20-24,2296,2270,
25-29,1987,1894,
30-34,1817,1757,
35-39,1692,1686,
40-44,1625,1588,
45-49,1326,1303,
50-54,1110,1099,
55-59,0903,0917,
60-64,0796,0844,
65-69,0610,0692,
70-74,0397,0492,
75-79,0197,0280,
80+..,0090,0158,

he gives deathrates per 1000 for Japan for 1910-1924:
21.1,20.4,20.0,19.5,20.6,20.2,21.6,21.6,26.7,22.8, 25.4,22.7,22.4,22.9,21.3

that would give ~ 280000 excess deaths in 1918, 209000 in 1920

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OK, I found the Japanese statistics data, see the other thread.
The missing 2M people between 1918 and 1920 can't be explained
as flu-victims, the age and sex distribution doesn't match.
Presumably some statistical corrections or changing territories or such.

[gsgs]

also skeptical:
https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article....2014.362/_pdf