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Coronavirus pandemic

1,675 deaths directly linked with coronavirus registered in Russia in April — deputy PM

According to Golikova, medics divided all the deaths into three groups

MOSCOW, May 29. /TASS/. As many as 1,675 deaths directly linked with the coronavirus infection were registered in Russia in April, with COVID-19 being test-confirmed in 1,136 cases, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Tatiana Golikova said on Friday.

According to Golikova, medics divided all the deaths into three groups. The first group includes those who died from the coronavirus infection that was confirmed by a positive test. The second group includes cases when the infection was not confirmed by tests but patients had clinical symptoms of the disease. And the third group includes coronavirus-positive patients who died from other illnesses.

"We merged the first two groups into one. There were 1,675 such deaths in Russia, of which COVID-19 was 100-percent confirmed in 1,136 cases," she said, adding that data on the second group may change following autopsy reports.

"The third group is linked with other causes of death. As a matter of fact, these are chronic diseases people had during their lives. But these people also had positive tests for the coronavirus infection. As of today, this group includes 1,038 cases," she said, adding that some these deaths were indirectly linked with the coronavirus infection.

However, Golikova, who heads the federal anti-coronavirus crisis center, noted that the authorities so far don’t have complete data on mortality for April. Mortality statistics may be adjusted, since civil registry offices in a number of Russian regions stayed closed during a period of non-working days from March 25 to May 11 imposed amid the coronavirus pandemic and failed to process data in time, she explained.

According to the mortality statistics published in April, the number of coronavirus-associated deaths stood at 1,135. Thus, the fatality rate in April was 1.02%, but if it is calculated for 1,675 deaths, it will be 1.51%, and in case the statistics includes deaths from other diseases not linked directly with the coronavirus, the mortality rate in April will be 2.4%

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