Methodology

Revised estimates of influenza-associated excess mortality, United States, 1995 through 2005

Ivo M Foppa¹ and Md Monir Hossain²

¹  Department of Epidemiology, Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, New Orleans, LA 70112, USA

²  Center for Clinical and Translational Sciences, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, TX 77030, USA

author email corresponding author email

Emerging Themes in Epidemiology 2008, 5:26doi:10.1186/1742-7622-5-26

Published:	30 December 2008

Abstract

Background

Excess mortality due to seasonal influenza is thought to be substantial. However, influenza may often not be recognized as cause of death. Imputation methods are therefore required to assess the public health impact of influenza. The purpose of this study was to obtain estimates of monthly excess mortality due to influenza that are based on an epidemiologically meaningful model.

Methods and Results

U.S. monthly all-cause mortality, 1995 through 2005, was hierarchically modeled as Poisson variable with a mean that linearly depends both on seasonal covariates and on influenza-certified mortality. It also allowed for overdispersion to account for extra variation that is not captured by the Poisson error. The coefficient associated with influenza-certified mortality was interpreted as ratio of total influenza mortality to influenza-certified mortality. Separate models were fitted for four age categories (<18, 18–49, 50–64, 65+). Bayesian parameter estimation was performed using Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods. For the eleven year study period, a total of 260,814 (95% CI: 201,011–290,556) deaths was attributed to influenza, corresponding to an annual average of 23,710, or 0.91% of all deaths.

Conclusion

Annual estimates for influenza mortality were highly variable from year to year, but they were systematically lower than previously published estimates. The excellent fit of our model with the data suggest validity of our estimates.