Malta’s COVID-19 Deaths In 2020 May Have Been Underestimated, OECD Report Finds
The number of deaths attributed to COVID-19 during 2020 was lower than in most EU countries and could have been underestimated, according to an OECD report on healthcare across the EU.
The report notes that COVID-19 accounted for 217 deaths in Malta, roughly 5.3% of all deaths, adding that most deaths were among older people.
“The cumulative mortality rate from COVID-19 was about 46% lower in Malta than the average across EU countries, at approximately 855 per million population, compared with an EU average of about 1,500,” the report reads.
It adds that the “broader indicator of excess mortality – defined as deaths from all causes above what would normally be expected based on previous years – suggests that the direct and indirect death toll related to COVD-19 in Malta could be higher.
The number of excess deaths between March and December 2020, it said, stood at roughly 500 and was “more than twice that of COVID-19 deaths, although the extent to which these deaths were caused by COVID-19 is unclear”.
While the pandemic hit Malta like every other country at the start of 2020, the fact that it is an island to which travel could be stopped and the fact that health authorities were able to implement measures such as two-week mandatory quarantine for anyone coming into contact with a positive COVID-19 case meant that the virus was initially slow to spread.
The report also noted that COVID-19 had led to a reduction in life expectancy during 2020, though this was again smaller than the EU average.
Life expectancy at birth in Malta was 82.6 years in 2020, the second-highest in the EU. According to the OECD, between 2019 and 2020, life expectancy in Malta declined by 0.3 years on average, well below the EU average of 0.7 years.
The life expectancy of men fell by 0.4 years during this period, while that for women experienced a negligible change.
While COVID-19 accounted for 5.3% of all deaths in 2020, the leading causes of mortality in Malta remained cardiovascular diseases at 34% of all deaths and cancer 28%.
Maltese prefer private healthcare despite national coverage
The report also looked into Malta’s “predominantly tax-financed” national health service, noting that the country had seen the largest real-term growth rate in total health spending in the EU.
It also had the third-highest growth in per capita health spending behind only Romania and Bulgaria, amounting to 8.8% of GDP.
Despite this, the OECD found that public funding only accounted for 63.5% of the healthcare spend in Malta, well below the EU average of 79.7%.
It found that the low share of public funding was driven by the high proportion of health spending paid out of pocket.
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