Iraq Mortality - The Lancet

Co-Author of Medical Study Estimating 650,000 Iraqi Deaths Defends Research in the Face of White House Dismissal

Thu, 12 Oct 2006 07:15:04 -0500

Co-Author of Medical Study Estimating 650,000 Iraqi Deaths Defends Research in the Face of White House Dismissal

Thursday, October 12th, 2006

The White House is dismissing the findings of a medical study that says 650,000 people have died in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion. The study was conducted by American and Iraqi researchers and published in the prestigious British medical journal, The Lancet. We’re joined by the report’s co-author, epidemiologist Les Roberts. [includes rush transcript]

More than 650,000 people have died in Iraq since the U.S. led invasion of the country began in March of 2003. This is according to a new study published in the scientific journal, The Lancet. The study was conducted by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Al Mustansiriya University in Baghdad. Researchers based their findings on interviews with a random sampling of households taken in clusters across Iraq. The study is an update to a prior one compiled by many of the same researchers. That study estimated that around 100,000 Iraqis died in the first 18 months after the invasion.

Study Shows Civilian Death Toll in Iraq More Than 100,000

Thu, 15 Dec 2005 16:14:48 -0600

...I’m even more struck that here a year after our study came out, the first time the President has been asked about this was not by a reporter, but by someone from the public when he took a question.
-Les Roberts

On the 1,000th day of the U.S. war on Iraq, we look at a subject that usually receives little attention -- the Iraqi civilian death toll since the war began. We speak with Dr. Les Roberts, the lead researcher of a study released last year on the number of deaths in Iraq, which put the toll at more than 100,000. [includes rush transcript] President Bush was asked about the Iraqi civilian death toll on Monday following his speech at the Philadelphia World Affairs Council.

Q: Since the inception of the Iraqi war, I'd like to know the approximate total of Iraqis who have been killed. And by Iraqis I include civilians, military, police, insurgents, translators.

THE PRESIDENT: How many Iraqi citizens have died in this war? I would say 30,000, more or less, have died as a result of the initial incursion and the ongoing violence against Iraqis. We've lost about 2,140 of our own troops in Iraq.

100,000 + The Likely Death Toll In Iraq

Sun, 2 Oct 2005 12:44:40 -0500

Source Justice Not Vengeance
By Milan Rai
December 18 2004

OVER 100,000 DEAD?

The Lancet, the world’s leading medical journal, has published an estimate that 98,000 Iraqis have died because of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. This estimate (usually approximated to 100,000 deaths) includes Iraqi civilians and insurgents, and includes all causes of death, both violent and nonviolent.

The 100,000 figure is likely to be an under-estimate.

Lancet roundup and literature review

Thu, 15 Sep 2005 05:53:04 -0500

Source: Crooked Timber
by Daniel Davies
November 11, 2004

Read full post at Crooked Timber

Responses to the 'Lancet Report' on Post-Invasion Mortality in Iraq (Nov 2004)

Mon, 29 Aug 2005 23:15:20 -0500

Source: Iraq Analysis Group
November, 2004

Responses to the 'Lancet Report' on Post-Invasion Mortality in Iraq -PDF (Nov 2004)

On 29 October, the Lancet, an eminent British medical journal, published a study by a team of researchers from the John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health entitled "Mortality before and after the 2003 invasion of Iraq" The authors concluded that

"making conservative assumptions, we think that about 100 000 excess deaths, or more have happened since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Violence accounted for most of the excess deaths and air strikes from coalition forces accounted for most violent deaths."

The full report is available for download (pdf file).

Iraq Analysis Group Briefing: the Lancet Iraq mortality survey -- the UK government's response is unjustified and disingenuous (20 Nov 2004)

On 17 November 2004, the UK Foreign Secretary produced a written ministerial statement response to the article Mortality before and after the 2003 invasion of Iraq: cluster sample survey published in the Lancet on 29 October 2004. The ministerial statement dismissed mortality estimates produced by the Lancet survey. This briefing argues that this dismissal largely unjustified, and parts disingenuous.
Iraq Analysis Group Briefing: the Lancet Iraq mortality survey -- the Prime Minister's response is inaccurate and misleading (01 Nov 2004)

This is our previous response to the statement by the Prime Minister's Official Spokesman about the Lancet study
Information sources page about the report

The Lancet Study

Mon, 8 Aug 2005 02:44:12 -0500

Source: Znet Blog
by Noam Chomsky
August 8, 2005

It’s correct that the Lancet study, by far the most authoritative available, deliberately excluded Fallujah, because that would have raised the estimates much higher—recall that as in all scientific inquiries in related areas (technically, anywhere), this one is based on extrapolation from samples, and they wanted to err on the side of conservatism. For the same reason, they included Kurdish regions where there was very little conflict, thereby reducing the estimates.

Dead Iraqis: Why an Estimate was Ignored

Tue, 15 Mar 2005 03:11:42 -0600

Source: The Columbia Journalism Review
by Lila Guterman
March/April 2005

Last fall, a major public-health study appeared in The Lancet, a prestigious British medical journal, only to be missed or dismissed by the American press. To the extent it was covered at all, the reports were short and usually buried far from the front pages of major newspapers. The results of the study could have played an important role in future policy decisions, but the press’s near total silence allowed the issue to pass without debate.

Researchers Who Rushed Into Print a Study of Iraqi Civilian Deaths Now Wonder Why It Was Ignored

Thu, 27 Jan 2005 03:34:30 -0600

Source: The Chronicle of Higher Education
by Lila Guterman
January 27, 2005

When more than 200,000 people died in a tsunami caused by an Asian earthquake in December, the immediate reaction in the United States was an outpouring of grief and philanthropy, prompted by extensive coverage in the news media.

Two months earlier, the reaction in the United States to news of another large-scale human tragedy was much quieter. In late October, a study was published in The Lancet, a prestigious British medical journal, concluding that about 100,000 civilians had been killed in Iraq since it was invaded by a United States-led coalition in March 2003. On the eve of a contentious presidential election -- fought in part over U.S. policy on Iraq -- many American newspapers and television news programs ignored the study or buried reports about it far from the top headlines.

Civilization versus Barbarism? : An Interview with Noam Chomsky

Thu, 23 Dec 2004 03:04:26 -0600

Source: Left Hook
by M. Junaid Alam and Noam Chomsky
December 23, 2004

On December 17th, Left Hook co-editor M. Junaid Alam met with Professor Noam Chomsky at his MIT office to get his thoughts on the ideological justifications and historical realities behind America's "war on terror." Professor Chomsky spent a half-hour taking apart the framework of "civilization" versus "barbarism," pointing to Western and particularly US state-sponsored atrocities, laying out the grave nature of war crimes committed in Iraq, attacking the intellectual culture which sanctions massive suffering, and explaining the elite's knowledge of the roots of terrorism.

-Transcribed by M. Junaid Alam and slightly edited for clarification by Professor Chomsky

The Death Toll In Iraq

Wed, 15 Dec 2004 04:02:14 -0600

The British Government Criticises The Lancet
Source: Justice Not Vengeance
By Milan Rai
15 December 2004

CRITICISING THE LANCET

As soon as the Lancet, the world’s leading medical journal, published an estimate that 98,000 Iraqis have died because of the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the British Government attempted to undermine this work.

The Lancet estimate (usually approximated to 100,000 deaths) includes Iraqi civilians and insurgents, and includes all causes of death, whether violent or nonviolent, and whether they were caused by foreigners (such as US pilots) or by Iraqis themselves.

Who counts the dead?

Mon, 6 Dec 2004 01:49:42 -0600

Source: New Statesman
by Michael Williams
December 6, 2004

Observations on Iraq

I know lots of things. I know that 935 Iranians applied for asylum in Britain in the third quarter of this year and I know that the price of pigs in the UK, France and Germany followed a very similar cyclical pattern throughout the 1990s. I know that there were 134,557 recorded crimes in Sussex in 2003-04 and I know that my son's primary school had an unauthorised absence rate of 1.1 per cent last year. I know these things because the government collects and publishes all these facts and millions more.

I also know that there are 15 officials on the Ministry of Defence press desk in Whitehall. So I called one of them to ask about casualties in Iraq. First, I asked how many British fatalities there were during Operation Telic. The answer is 74. The youngest was 18, the oldest 55. Each one is recorded on the MoD website, which shows photos and biographies and best wishes to the families. The site is decent and dignified, and so it should be.

Next, I asked if the MoD knew how many Iraqi civilians had been killed in the conflict. "No. There is no definitive figure on that."

How many dead innocent Iraqis is too many?

Tue, 9 Nov 2004 03:50:38 -0600

Source: The Age
by Waleed Aly
November 9, 2004

Surely we have not been reduced to arguing that we are not as bad as terrorists, writes Waleed Aly.

Too many innocent people are dying in Iraq. A recent report, in the medical journal The Lancet, estimates 100,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed since the beginning of the US-led invasion. Half of them are women and children. Almost all were killed by coalition air strikes.

Take a minute to think about the enormity of this human cost. Think of it as September 11, 30 times over.

100,000 Iraqis Dead: Should We Believe It?

Fri, 5 Nov 2004 16:18:51 -0600

Source: Znet by Stephen Soldz November 03, 2004

[corrected 11/5/04*]

One justification for the Iraq war was to remove the barbarous regime of Saddam Hussein, thereby freeing Iraqis from the threat of death at the hands of his regime. Yet, from the first days of the war, accounts have surfaced of Iraqi civilian deaths at the hands of "coalition forces" and from the increased crime and chaos that have swept much of the country.

The United States and its British and other allies claim they do everything in their power to prevent civilian casualties. Yet, repeatedly accounts have appeared of civilians dying at checkpoints, in passing American convoys, in house searches, and in the relentless bombing campaigns that are allegedly precision strikes on known terrorist hideouts. Reports have also surfaced about increased murder rates.[1] If the rates of Iraqi civilian deaths increased significantly since the invasion, it would undercut the last remaining rationale for the war.

Counting the casualties

Wed, 3 Nov 2004 23:49:30 -0600

Source: The Economist
November 4, 2004

A statistically based study claims that many more Iraqis have died in the conflict than previous estimates indicated

THE American armed forces have long stated that they do not keep track of how many people have been killed in the current conflict in Iraq and, furthermore, that determining such a number is impossible. Not everybody agrees. Adding up the number of civilians reported killed in confirmed press accounts yields a figure of around 15,000. But even that is likely to be an underestimate, for not every death gets reported. The question is, how much of an underestimate?

Talking rubbish about epidemiology

Mon, 1 Nov 2004 04:18:02 -0600

Source: Crooked Timber
by Daniel Davies
November 1, 2004

As Chris said, with respect to the Lancet study on excess Iraqi deaths, “I can predict with certainty that there will be numerous posts on weblogs supporting the war attacking the study”. Score several Cassandra points for Chris, they weren’t slow in coming. You can have the know-nothing rightwing flack variety or the handwringing liberal variety. And to be honest, the standard of critique is enough to make you weep.