Impact of COVID-19 on the mortality rates for the resident population of the Umbria region in Italy

Bietta, C.; Morini, M.; Kamber Zaidi, A.; Cozzolino, F.; Dehgani-Mobaraki, P.

The mortality figures related to the coronavirus pandemic has been the topic of debate lately. Several hypothesis are made regarding the expected number of deaths in a region but there are various factors governing the same. In this paper, we have discussed the mortality figures in the Umbria region after analyzing the data from the national Health registry between December 2019 to April 2020; the period of infection and its comparison with the data from previous five years. The factors governing these figures were studied including temperature, standard mortality rates, territorial distribution, death due to all cases as well as the non-COVID deaths. A sharp increase in mortality figures was observed for the month of march and low temperature also had a role to play. However the difference when compared to previous 5 years was not significant as was expected at the start of the study. A single factor cannot be responsible for the total mortality figures in a region as is frequently predicted.