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View Full Version : New British poll on Iraq deaths confirms 1 million figure


Bill
01-30-2008, 06:11 PM
Why can't these pollsters get with the neocon program?

A new poll appears to confirm the Lancet study and refute the Iragi
ministry of Health study.

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-iraq-deaths-survey.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Iraq Conflict Has Killed A Million Iraqis: Survey By REUTERS
Published: January 30, 2008

LONDON (Reuters) - More than one million Iraqis have died as a result of the conflict in their country since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, according to research conducted by one of Britain's leading polling groups.

The survey, conducted by Opinion Research Business (ORB) with 2,414 adults in face-to-face interviews, found that 20 percent of people had had at least one death in their household as a result of the conflict, rather than natural causes.

The last complete census in Iraq conducted in 1997 found 4.05 million households in the country, a figure ORB used to calculate that approximately 1.03 million people had died as a result of the war, the researchers found.

The margin of error in the survey, conducted in August and September 2007, was 1.7 percent, giving a range of deaths of 946,258 to 1.12 million.

ORB originally found that 1.2 million people had died, but decided to go back and conduct more research in rural areas to make the survey as comprehensive as possible and then came up with the revised figure.

The research covered 15 of Iraq's 18 provinces. Those that not covered included two of Iraq's more volatile regions -- Kerbala and Anbar -- and the northern province of Arbil, where local authorities refused them a permit to work.

Estimates of deaths in Iraq have been highly controversial in the past.

Medical journal The Lancet published a peer-reviewed report in 2004 stating that there had been 100,000 more deaths than would normally be expected since the March 2003 invasion, kicking off a storm of protest.

The widely watched Web site Iraq Body Count currently estimates that between 80,699 and 88,126 people have died in the conflict, although its methodology and figures have also been questioned by U.S. authorities and others.

ORB, a non-government-funded group founded in 1994, conducts research for the private, public and voluntary sectors.

The director of the group, Allan Hyde, said it had no objective other than to record as accurately as possible the number of deaths among the Iraqi population as a result of the invasion and ensuing conflict.

Smurf-Herder
01-30-2008, 07:10 PM
Why can't these pollsters get with the neocon program?

A new poll appears to confirm the Lancet study and refute the Iragi
ministry of Health study.

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-iraq-deaths-survey.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin


You can't do death counts in something as abstract as a war by having limited surveys and extrapolating the figures out. It's not like voter opinion surveys. An actual death in a war is a unique thing. You can't say an accurate number is a percentage based on a survey.

(especially when all the studies that do actual counts are all in the same ballpark - the ballpark that this study and the Lancet study are way out of; based on extrapolating percentages from surveys)

Bill
01-30-2008, 07:31 PM
Funny how polls work on everything but what you wish they wouldn't.

You're aware of the reason suggested for why the Iraqi Health Ministry poll came up with a number about halfway between the lancet poll and the official figures, I'm sure.

Turns out the Health Ministry is controlled by Sadrites - something all Iraqis know, but americans don't.

Smurf-Herder
01-30-2008, 07:34 PM
Funny how polls work on everything but what you wish they wouldn't.

You're aware of the reason suggested for why the Iraqi Health Ministry poll came up with a number about halfway between the lancet poll and the official figures, I'm sure.

Turns out the Health Ministry is controlled by Sadrites - something all Iraqis know, but americans don't.

Isn't there some UN Health organization that is the end-all authority on death figures? I mean, doesn't the UN do that in other countries?

Otherwise, we're just all going to be coming up with different figures over and over again, for the next few years.

Bill
01-30-2008, 07:43 PM
Otherwise, we're just all going to be coming up with different figures over and over again, for the next few years.

That's how science works - except in the realm of pure mathematics, where absolute answers are possible.

You collect measurements, refine your parameters, and collect measurements again. You repeat until there is peer consensus that future measurement has reached the point of diminished valuable returns. But, you remain open to new data entering the discussion, which might require further measurements to confirm or refute.

It takes time, but it's the method that has produced the technological civilization we enjoy.

Polling technology is fairly well developed, altho it can be manipulated, which is why multiple competeing polls are the standard. It's good news that we are starting to see multiple polls being released, this will really inspire the researchers to do more work, to resolve the contradiction.

And these latest ORB pollsters openly admit they didn't poll in the two most dangerous regions - polling there would almost certianly have increased the final estimate.

Yirmeyahu
01-30-2008, 10:13 PM
You can't do death counts in something as abstract as a war by having limited surveys and extrapolating the figures out. It's not like voter opinion surveys. An actual death in a war is a unique thing. You can't say an accurate number is a percentage based on a survey.

(especially when all the studies that do actual counts are all in the same ballpark - the ballpark that this study and the Lancet study are way out of; based on extrapolating percentages from surveys)

"Actual counts"? There are no "actual counts". Hence the necessity for scientific surveys to estimate the number.

Moby
01-31-2008, 01:05 AM
Attacking this number is just trying to ignore the real issue.

The bottom line is that we hung Saddam for genocide of 148 people. The best estimates from the conservative groups is that 1,000 times that have been killed.

The genocide or atrocity argument works with best numbers just as easily as with the worst.