Is every death of a person with COVID-19 counted as a COVID death?
The CDC says COVID-19 should not be reported on a death certificate if it did not cause or contribute to the death -- in other words, if a person with COVID died in an accident, that would not be counted as a COVID death.
The implication in a post on social media is that any time someone infected with COVID-19 dies, their death is counted as a coronavirus death. That's not true -- the CDC has specific guidelines for filling out death certificates.
Among the guidelines:
"COVID-19 should not be reported on the death certificate if it did not cause or contribute to the death."
A study published in JAMA Internal Medicine said about 30% of COVID deaths during the first three months of the pandemic may not have been classified as such -- meaning, if anything, COVID-19 deaths in that period were under-counted.