# Covid-19

## On mixing covid-19 and census data

Doing this with Canadian data is a tall order. But since people are doing it, we might as well explain some of the ins and outs.

Mixing census data with COVID-19 case and mortality data seems like an obvious thing to do when trying to understand how COVID-19 affects different groups. But it’s only of very limited use. COVID-19 data is only (openly) available on coarse geographies and can only be matched at the ecological level. Deriving individual level relationships from this is extremely ambitious. At best, it can inform decisions on what individual level data should be collected moving forward.

## COVID-19 data in Canada, effective reproduction rates

A follow-up on what data we need.

We have written about the situation of covid-19 data in Canada previously, and the need for good data is becoming more pressing as we are poised to slowly open up some of our restrictions and need to closely monitor how the spread of COVID-19 is responding. A key number to watch is the effective reproduction rate, the average number of people an infected person passes on the virus ($R_0$). Our collective social distancing has led to the effective reproduction rate to drop below 1, so the spread of the virus is receding.

## COVID deaths in context by weeks

An updated view at covid-19 mortality and excess mortality.

(Joint with Nathan Lauster and cross-posted at HomeFreeSociology) In our previous post on COVID mortality in context, we tried to place COVID deaths, as recorded so far this year, in the context of expected deaths from previous years. There have been a lot more developments since that post. And unfortunately a lot more deaths too. Here we’re providing an update to our previous post, but also expanding on that post by talking a bit more about new mortality analyses and the progression of outbreaks in terms of expected deaths on a weekly basis.

## Covid-19 data in Canada

Covid-19 data for Canada is hard to come by. Where to get the data, what it tells us and what's missing.