- Russia has admitted its death toll from the coronavirus pandemic is actually three-times larger than previous estimates it had released
- The country has revealed an estimated 186,000 Russians have died after contracting COVID-19, making it the world’s third-largest death toll
- It’s a stark increase from the previous total number of deaths recorded in Russia, which sat at just over 55,000
- Health officials within the country had previously sounded the alarm that Russia may have been falsifying the number of deaths from COVID-19
- In the meantime, Moscow has already begun vaccination high-risk residents across the nation after approving its own COVID-19 vaccine
Russia has admitted to a much-higher COVID-19 death toll than previously admitted, making the country’s fatality rate the third-largest in the world.
The nation’s Deputy Prime Minister admitted on Monday that the number of deaths related to the pandemic had risen three-fold.
Tatiana Golikova said in a press conference that 229,700 people had died between January and November, an increase of 81 per cent compared to 2019.
Over 186,000 of those deaths are related to COVID-19, well above the previous estimate of around 55,000 deaths.
“More than 81 per cent of this increase in mortality over this period is due to Covid,” Deputy Prime Minister Tatiana Golikova confirmed.
The change in fatality numbers comes after health officials within Russia raised concerns that the country wasn’t disclosing the full impact of COVID-19.
More than three million infections of coronavirus have been recorded in the country to date, but only 55,200 deaths, making the death toll relatively low in comparison to other countries.
The low rate was primarily due to the country only recording COVID-19 deaths where the virus had been listed on the deceased individual’s autopsy report.
But, this latest update on the true number of deaths related to the pandemic brings Russia’s death toll in line with the U.S. and Brazil — which have the first and second-largest number of COVID-19 fatalities in the world respectively.
Moscow has already begun vaccination high-risk residents across the nation against the virus after approving its own COVID-19 vaccine.
The Sputnik V jab has already been rolled out to frontline healthcare workers and even more recently to those aged over 60.
However, it’s unknown whether the country will target vaccinating the full extent of its population — which totals over 144 million people.