Excess mortality during the COVID-19 pandemic (2020–2021) in an urban community of Bangladesh

Abstract

Measuring COVID-19-related mortality is vital for making public health policy decisions. The magnitude of COVID-19-related mortality is largely unknown in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), including Bangladesh, due to inadequate COVID-19 testing capacity and a lack of robust civil registration and vital statistics systems. Even with the lack of data, cemetery-based death records in LMICs may provide insightful information on potential COVID-19-related mortality rates; nevertheless, there is a dearth of research employing cemetery-based death records. This study aimed to assess the excess mortality during the COVID-19 pandemic in an urban setting in Bangladesh using a cemetery-based death registration dataset. A total of 6,271 deaths recorded between January 2015 and December 2021 were analysed using a Bayesian structural time series model. Exploratory analysis found that the average monthly number of deaths was 69 during the pre-COVID-19 period (January 2015-February 2020), but significantly increased to 92 during the COVID-19 period (March 2020-December 2021). The increase in male deaths was twice as large as the increase in female deaths. Model-based results were not statistically significant (relative effect 17%, 95% credible interval: -18%, 57%), but there was an overall increasing trend during the COVID-19 period, and specific months or shorter periods had a substantial increase. This first-of-its-kind study in Bangladesh has assessed the excess mortality in an urban community during the COVID-19 pandemic. Cemetery-based death registration appears to aid in tracking population mortality, especially in resource-limited countries where collecting data on the ground is challenging during crisis periods; however, additional large-scale research is required.