Age is not the only factor to explain excess mortality since Covid 19. Living conditions, working conditions, access to care are paramount in understanding the devastation of this pandemic, the return of which is still feared.
This observation, which was already valid for Seine-Saint-Denis, is now verified on the scale of Ile-de-France. “At the same age, the most disadvantaged areas have paid the heaviest price during the Covid epidemic”, summarizes Isabelle Gremy, epidemiologist doctor and director of the Regional Health Observatory (ORS). As it had done at the scale of the 93, the ORS has scrutinized all the intermunicipal authorities of Ile-de-France, the contrasting results of which we reveal here.
25,700 deaths in two months
“Until deconfinement, the Ile de France was by far the first affected region, ahead of Mayotte and the Grand Est” notes INSEE in a publication on June 30. All causes combined, these deaths represent 18% of deaths nationally (compared to 12% on average over the same period between 2015 and 2019).
Until now, only the number of deaths by department was available. And again, we had to wait to get them. Because initially, deaths are recorded where the deceased succumb. The death of an inhabitant of Val-d’Oise, for example, in a Parisian hospital was counted as a death in Paris. It took several weeks to know precisely that it was the death of a Val-d’Oisien. This is called “domiciled deaths”.
Clearly, it was necessary to know, not where the deceased struck down by the Covid had died, but where they lived, and how, to better understand the epidemic. Depending on the sector, the declarations were not all digitized but had to be done physically, through the civil status services. INSEE collected this information to which the ORS had access.
But that was not yet enough to draw solid conclusions. To compare territories that do not have the same age pyramids, for example, similar population samples are still needed. “This is called the standardized rate method, which allows municipalities and agglomerations to be compared with each other,” explains Catherine Mangeney, socio-demographer at the ORS who co-signed the study. The comparison is made with the average over the same period (March and April) since 2015.
Plaine-Commune, Est-Ensemble, Roissy-Pays-de-France scarlet
Excess mortality is on the rise in all agglomerations, with very contrasting differences. In scarlet red, Plaine Commune, Est-Ensemble, Roissy-Pays de France. At the municipal level, in Sarcelles and Gonesse (Val-d’Oise), Savigny-le-Temple (Seine-et-Marne), Fleury-Mérogis and Grigny (Essonne), in Villeneuve-la-Garenne and Gennevilliers (Hauts -de-Seine), Epinay and Le Bourget (Seine-Saint-Denis), the death rate has more than tripled. The distinction was made in the first half of March. It was only in the second half of April that the trend slowed, a month and a half after the start of confinement.
Also note, cities with a less popular profile and yet in dark red too, such as Ormesson (Val-de-Marne) or Le Pré-Saint-Gervais (Seine-Saint-Denis). No formal explanation is advanced. We are just suggesting clusters or deaths in nursing homes, among the avenues to explore. Other, more precise studies have already been announced to better understand the determining factors of excess mortality.
