Missouri Coroner Won’t List COVID Death If Family Asks

The Kansas City Star reports:

Macon County Coroner Brian Hayes handles the death certificates for this cattle, corn and soybean region of 15,000 in north-central Missouri, near Kirksville — roughly 130 to 140 deaths each year. That includes certifying the deaths of the few dozen residents who have succumbed to the coronavirus.

And in some cases, it has meant excluding COVID-19 from death certificates. COVID-19 is as much a political issue as a personal tragedy for some families. They don’t want the virus on any official record for their dead loved one.

The politics and conspiracy theories surrounding the pandemic are still prime dinner table talk, and have led many to resist calls to wear masks, get vaccinated and to acknowledge that those who died over the past 18 months had contracted the virus.

Read the full article.

NEW – A Missouri county coroner has allowed families to excludes COVID from death certificates, affecting pandemic fatality reporting

Important reporting from @jakekincaid31 @derekkravitz @Cameron_Barnard https://t.co/B2gi17gBdw

— Jonathan Shorman (@jonshorman) August 3, 2021

Appalling. As with AIDS, “Silence equals death”.

— michael musto (@mikeymusto) August 3, 2021