Meanwhile, south of the border the same request in March (deaths within 28 days of vaccination) was denied by ONS on the grounds that there was a view to publishing the data in the future. The questioner was referred to a Release Schedule.
I hope this questioner didn’t hold their breath for up to 28 days, because a month later another almost identical request was told:
“Unfortunately, we do not hold analysis showing deaths from all causes within 28 days of having the COVID-19 vaccine.”
It’s an interesting answer. Firstly for it’s slight defensiveness - no ‘analysis’ was needed, the Scottish FOI answer was just the number, which was all the questioner requested.
But then also the change of tune. The ONS is a competent, professional body IMO. If they didn’t have the data (why wouldn’t they, Scotland did) I doubt they would have told the first questioner they were thinking of publishing it!
ED
(Response to first letter)
Deaths for any reason within 28 days of the COVID-19 vaccine
Release date:
19 March 2021
You asked
How many people have died for any reason, within 28 days of being administered, any vaccine related to sars-cov-2 (covid-19) in England & Wales since vaccinations began.
We said
Thank you for your enquiry.
We have data for England vaccinations and are in the process of developing our analytical plans. Once we have finalised these plans a publication date will be released on our Release Calendar.
As such, the information you have requested is considered exempt under Section 22(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, whereby information is exempt from release if there is a view to publish the information in the future. Furthermore, as a central government department and producer of official statistics, we need to have the freedom to be able to determine our own publication timetables. This is to allow us to deal with the necessary preparation, administration and context of publications. It would be unreasonable to consider disclosure when to do so would undermine our functions.
This exemption is subject to a public interest test. We recognise the desirability of information being freely available and this is considered by ONS when publication schedules are set in accordance with the Code of Practice for Statistics. The need for timely data must be balanced against the practicalities of applying statistical skill and judgement to produce the high quality, assured data needed to inform decision-making. If this balance is incorrectly applied, then we run the risk of decisions being based on inaccurate data which is arguably not in the public interest. This will have an impact on public trust in official statistics in a time when accuracy of official statistics is more important to the public than ever before.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/aboutus/transparencyandgovernance/freedomofinformationfoi/deathsforanyreasonwithin28daysofthecovid19vaccine
(Response to second letter)
Deaths of all causes within 28 days of receiving the COVID-19 vaccine
Release date:
20 April 2021
You asked
Do you have statistics for deaths of all causes within 28 days of having the COVID-19 vaccine?
We said
Thank you for your request.
Unfortunately, we do not hold analysis showing deaths from all causes within 28 days of having the COVID-19 vaccine.
In case it is of interest, we hold vaccination data for England and we are currently developing our analytical plans with an intention to publish statistics on vaccination effectiveness soon. Once we have finalised these plans a publication date will be announced on our Release Calendar.
Also, all cause deaths and deaths involving COVID-19 are published in our weekly deaths dataset, which may be of interest. This data set is updated every Tuesday.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/aboutus/transparencyandgovernance/freedomofinformationfoi/deathsofallcauseswithin28daysofreceivingthecovid19vaccine
) not 15 million but that takes the total expected deaths to about 1700.