The Volokh Conspiracy

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Belgium's Coronavirus Death Rate Surpasses Italy's

In the meantime, neighboring Netherlands, which a few weeks ago had a similar rate to Belgium's, now has half of Belgium's.

|The Volokh Conspiracy |


I don't know why this is happening (different initial infection patterns? different containment policies? different treatment policies? different healthcare quality? different reporting practices?), but I thought I'd note it. Spain is at 374 deaths per million, Belgium at 337, Italy at 329, France at 221, UK at 167, Netherlands at 165 (Worldometer data). By way of comparison, US is at 67.

[UPDATE, Apr. 13, 2020, 7:45 pm: The Italy count has gone up to 338 during the day because of newly reported data, so Belgium is still barely behind Italy, but given Belgium's and Italy's pace (Belgium has recently been having more than half as many daily coronavirus deaths as Italy, with 1/5 of the population of Italy), it seems certain that tomorrow Belgium will surpass Italy for good.

FURTHER UPDATE, Apr. 14, 2020, 7:30 am: Belgium is now at 359, and though the Italy count hasn't yet been updated today, it seems pretty clear from the recent pace that Italy's will be below that.]

Eugene Volokh is the Gary T. Schwartz Distinguished Professor of Law at UCLA and a Visiting Fellow (Senior Fellow starting May 2024) at the Hoover Institution (Stanford). Naturally, his posts here (like the opinions of the other bloggers) are his own, and not endorsed by any educational institution.