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WHO, Indeed

New Iraqi death estimate, way down from Lancet fantasy report. Iraqi Govt, WHO study estimates 151,000 between 2003-06. So who are they, and who killed them? Washington Post report on as-yet unpublished study doesn’t answer that:   

A new survey estimates that 151,000 Iraqis died from violence in the three years following the U.S.-led invasion of the country. Roughly 9 out of 10 of those deaths were a consequence of U.S. military operations, insurgent attacks and sectarian warfare.

This report doesn’t include details to support the ordering above, which tends to suggest the U.S. military has killed more people than Iraqi terrorists have. It will be interesting when it is published in the New England Journal of Medicine at the end of the month to see how many deaths in fact are attributed to U.S. military action, as opposed to insurgent attacks and sectarian warfare, if the survey in fact attempted to do so.  Also, whether there is any effort whatsoever to distinguish innocent bystanders or  the purposeful civilian targets of terrorist executions and suicide bombs  from combatants, uniformed or illegal.  I’m guessing no.

The three-year toll of violent deaths calculated in the survey is one-quarter the size of that found in a smaller survey by Iraqi and Johns Hopkins University researchers published in the journal Lancet in 2006.

Both teams used the same method — a random sample of houses throughout the country. For the new study, however, surveyors visited 23 times as many places and interviewed five times as many households. Surveyors also got more outside supervision in the recent study; that wasn’t possible in the spring of 2006 when the Johns Hopkins survey was conducted.

The estimate of 654,000 was on its face ridiculous and has since been taken to pieces.  It will be interesting to see how 151,000 stands up to scrutiny.  Its findings are already being questioned by … one of the Johns Hopkins authors:

Les Roberts, an epidemiologist now at Columbia University who helped direct the Johns Hopkins survey, also praised the new one. While both found a large increase in mortality, his found that much more of it was caused by violence.

“My gut feeling is that most of the difference between the two studies is a reluctance to report to the government a death due to violence,” he said. “If your son is fighting the government and died, that may not be something you’d want to admit to the government.”

Topics: Iraq

  Posted by Jules Crittenden at 8:58 am on Thursday, January 10, 2008

11 Responses to “WHO, Indeed”

1. The_Real_JeffS Says:
   January 10th, 2008 at 9:39 am

   Anyone from the original Lancet “study” questioning any subsequent reports from Iraq brings new meaning to the word “hypocrisy”.

2. Don Surber » Blog Archive » Around the horn Says:
   January 10th, 2008 at 10:03 am

   [...] Crittenden has fun with the latest UN-approved casualty numbers for Iraq. He’s [...]

3. SoldiersDad Says:
   January 10th, 2008 at 10:55 am

   Unless I’ve misread…the study includes Iraqi Insurgent Deaths. Just using a simple rule of thumb…any fight with the US Military is going to result in a 20-1 kill ratio…the US Gets credit fot 60,000 dead insurgents…or 40% of the total.

4. tanstaafl Says:
   January 10th, 2008 at 11:18 am

   The planets’ leftoids went bonkers (moreso than usual) with the numbers from that original Johns Hopkins “cluster sample” study in Iraq.

   While the leftoid friendly editor in chief at The Lancet happily published the stuff and brought his “respected journal” down a few notches.

5. The Anchoress » Blog Archive » A quick turn around the web… Says:
   January 10th, 2008 at 11:59 am

   [...] Jules Crittenden is questioning the new Iraqi death estimate. [...]

6. PoliGazette » 151,000 Iraqis Died 2003-2006 Says:
   January 10th, 2008 at 12:00 pm

   [...] Via Jules Crittenden comes the news that “a new survey estimates that 151,000 Iraqis died from violence in the three years following the U.S.-led invasion of the country.” Some 136,000 of those 151,000 casualties “were a consequence of U.S. military operations, insurgent attacks and sectarian warfare.” [...]

7. The Thunder Run Says:
   January 10th, 2008 at 1:32 pm

   Web Reconnaissance for 01/10/2008

   A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day…so check back often.

8. Terrye Says:
   January 10th, 2008 at 5:40 pm

   I read elsewhere that the number was about 50,000. Needless to say this will be seen as propaganda for the left even if it is a fraction of the Lancet numbers. But who can really know what the numbers are? Back in the 90’s people who were anti American said the sanctions caused 100,000 deaths a year. And we know that Saddam killed hundreds of thousands in the Shia uprising alone.

   Just think, if the Congress and the UN had been willing to sanction regime change back in 91, all these people would have been spared.

9. websmith Says:
   January 11th, 2008 at 12:40 am

   Break out the champaign. We have only killed 150,000 people.

10. spqrzilla Says:
    January 11th, 2008 at 1:50 am

    websmith writes: “Break out the champaign. We have only killed 150,000 people.”

    That’s a rather brazen misrepresentation. The study does not assert that the United States killed that number of people.

11. tanstaafl Says:
    January 13th, 2008 at 10:25 am

    I knew sundry (often Soros related) shadow organizations were funding stuff like Cindy Sheehan’s travels around the planet and various rallies and protests.

    But this is completely beyond the pale.

    A STUDY that claimed 650,000 people were killed as a result of the invasion of Iraq was partly funded by the antiwar billionaire George Soros.

    Soros, 77, provided almost half the £50,000 cost of the research, which appeared in The Lancet, the medical journal. Its claim was 10 times higher than consensus estimates of the number of war dead.

    http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article3177653.ece

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