Browsing by Author "Moultrie, Tom A"

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    Rapid mortality surveillance using a national population register to monitor excess deaths during SARS-CoV-2 pandemic in South Africa
    (Springer International Publishing, 2021-09-03) Dorrington, Rob E; Moultrie, Tom A; Laubscher, Ria; Groenewald, Pam J; Bradshaw, Debbie
    This paper describes how an up-to-date national population register recording deaths by age and sex, whether deaths were due to natural or unnatural causes, and the offices at which the deaths were recorded can be used to monitor excess death during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, both nationally, and sub-nationally, in a country with a vital registration system that is neither up to date nor complete. Apart from suggesting an approach for estimating completeness of reporting at a sub-national level, the application produces estimates of the number of deaths in excess of those expected in the absence of the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic that are highly correlated with the confirmed number of COVID-19 deaths over time, but at a level 2.5 to 3 times higher than the official numbers of COVID-19 deaths. Apportioning the observed excess deaths more precisely to COVID, COVID-related and collateral deaths, and non-COVID deaths averted by interventions with reduced mobility and gatherings, etc., requires access to real-time cause-of-death information. It is suggested that the transition from ICD-10 to ICD-11 should be used as an opportunity to change from a paper-based system to electronic capture of the medical cause-of-death information.
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    Teenage fertility rates falling in South Africa
    (2007) Moultrie, Tom A; McGrath, Nuala
    Much noise has recently been made in the popular media suggesting a link between the launch of the Child Support Grant (CSG) and an apparent rise in teenage fertility. This perception persists in spite of a detailed study commissioned by the Department of Social Development that found no evidence of ‘perverse incentives’ for childbearing associated with the CSG; a second report came to the same conclusion, despite presenting internally inconsistent estimates of the levels of teenage fertility in the country and by population group in the last decade. It is desirable to place in the public domain as much evidence as possible regarding the trends and differentials in teenage fertility rates over an extended period of time.