What counts as a death from the Wuhan coronavirus?

One would think someone who died from the virus, right? That would be logical.

But not so much.

It appears to depend on where you are. So, for example, let’s hear from the folks in Illinois what they are counting as a “COVID” death.

Here’s Illinois’ Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike saying people are listed as a coronavirus death even if they died of alternative causes. “Even if you died of a clear alternate cause but you had COVID at the same time it’s still listed as a COVID death.”

"Even if you died of a clear alternate cause but you had COVID at the same time it's still listed as a COVID death."

Illinois' Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike says people are listed as a coronavirus death even if they died of alternative causes. pic.twitter.com/mtButgXHn2

— MRCTV (@mrctv) April 25, 2020

She notes, for example, if a man was in a hospice and was given weeks to live and happened to catch it, but die from the underlying condition, he would be counted as a “COVID” death.

There are also reports that the new bill included money for hospitals for virus patients. So, it seems to pay to list someone as a virus patient.

The package will also temporarily lift the automatic 2% Medicare payment cuts imposed by what is known as federal sequestration, and will increase pay for hospitals treating Medicare patients with Covid-19 by 20%.

— Barron’s (@barronsonline) March 26, 2020

As my colleague Streiff reported, in New York it was even worse. They threw in 3700 cases as virus deaths because they were “presumed” to have the virus.

So, basically they’re throwing in anything that could possibly be related, even if it isn’t confirmed and even if it didn’t actually cause the death.

Compare that to the swine flu where the CDC stopped counting after they realized it was a pandemic and just estimated a range.