The Short Term Mortality Fluctuations series: new data resource on weekly mortality
Dmitry Jdanov1, AINHOA ALUSTIZA, Vladimir Shkolnikov1, Domantas Jasilionis1, Laszlo Nemeth1, David Leon2, Magali Barbieri3, Carl Boe4
1Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, 2London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (UK), 3Institut National d’Études Démographiques (INED), 4University of California-Berkeley
The COVID-19 pandemic revealed the lack of progress in establishing efficient international and national statistical monitoring systems for providing timely, accurate, and comparable across countries data for the first-line epidemiological and policy response. A robust and reliable approach to quantify the mortality burden due to short-term risk factors is based on estimating weekly excess deaths. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Human Mortality Database established a new data resource on weekly mortality: the Short-term Mortality Fluctuations (STMF) data series. This is the first international scientific database providing harmonized, uniform, and fully documented data on weekly all-cause mortality. The STMF has the visualization tool. This application yields a visual representation of the database that enhances the understanding of the underlying data. In addition, it enables users to gather statistical information on excess mortality. The STMF is freely available at the HMD website (www.mortality.org).