Wednesday, July 20, 2005

On the numbers

Several articles I've read imply that the Iraq Body Count report contradicts the Lancet findings of last October. The Guardian, for example, says:

Researchers from Johns Hopkins University and Columbia University in the US and the Al-Mustansiriya University in Baghdad put the civilian death toll at up to 100,000 since the invasion.

The study was based on interviews with Iraqis, most of them doctors, but conceded that the data on which the projections were based was of "limited precision."

Not everyone includes the following, but I think it's important:
Sloboda stressed that his report did not necessarily contradict the study in The Lancet, which also included non-violent deaths said to be caused by the war.

The new figures were simply meant to be "an absolutely firm, unshakeable baseline" for the minimum number of violent deaths, he said.
For more, see here and here and here.

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