Based on a comparison of coronavirus deaths in 210 countries relative to their population, Peru had the most losses to COVID-19 up until July 13, 2022. As of the same date, the virus had infected over 557.8 million people worldwide, and the number of deaths had totaled more than 6.3 million. Note, however, that COVID-19 test rates can vary per country. Additionally, big differences show up between countries when combining the number of deaths against confirmed COVID-19 cases. The source seemingly does not differentiate between "the Wuhan strain" (2019-nCOV) of COVID-19, "the Kent mutation" (B.1.1.7) that appeared in the UK in late 2020, the 2021 Delta variant (B.1.617.2) from India or the Omicron variant (B.1.1.529) from South Africa.

The difficulties of death figures

This table aims to provide a complete picture on the topic, but it very much relies on data that has become more difficult to compare. As the coronavirus pandemic developed across the world, countries already used different methods to count fatalities, and they sometimes changed them during the course of the pandemic. On April 16, for example, the Chinese city of Wuhan added a 50 percent increase in their death figures to account for community deaths. These deaths occurred outside of hospitals and went unaccounted for so far. The state of New York did something similar two days before, revising their figures with 3,700 new deaths as they started to include “assumed” coronavirus victims. The United Kingdom started counting deaths in care homes and private households on April 29, adjusting their number with about 5,000 new deaths (which were corrected lowered again by the same amount on August 18). This makes an already difficult comparison even more difficult. Belgium, for example, counts suspected coronavirus deaths in their figures, whereas other countries have not done that (yet). This means two things. First, it could have a big impact on both current as well as future figures. On April 16 already, UK health experts stated that if their numbers were corrected for community deaths like in Wuhan, the UK number would change from 205 to “above 300”. This is exactly what happened two weeks later. Second, it is difficult to pinpoint exactly which countries already have “revised” numbers (like Belgium, Wuhan or New York) and which ones do not. One work-around could be to look at (freely accessible) timelines that track the reported daily increase of deaths in certain countries. Several of these are available on our platform, such as for Belgium, Italy and Sweden. A sudden large increase might be an indicator that the domestic sources changed their methodology.

Where are these numbers coming from?

The numbers shown here were collected by Johns Hopkins University, a source that manually checks the data with domestic health authorities. For the majority of countries, this is from national authorities. In some cases, like China, the United States, Canada or Australia, city reports or other various state authorities were consulted. In this statistic, these separately reported numbers were put together. For more information or other freely accessible content, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

As of January 13, 2023, Bulgaria had the highest rate of COVID-19 deaths among its population in Europe at 548.6 deaths per 100,000 population. Hungary had recorded 496.4 deaths from COVID-19 per 100,000. Furthermore, Russia had the highest number of confirmed COVID-19 deaths in Europe, at over 394 thousand.

Number of cases in Europe During the same period, across the whole of Europe, there have been over 270 million confirmed cases of COVID-19. France has been Europe's worst affected country with around 38.3 million cases, this translates to an incidence rate of approximately 58,945 cases per 100,000 population. Germany and Italy had approximately 37.6 million and 25.3 million cases respectively.

Current situation In March 2023, the rate of cases in Austria over the last seven days was 224 per 100,000 which was the highest in Europe. Luxembourg and Slovenia both followed with seven day rates of infections at 122 and 108 respectively.

As of January 18, 2023, Portugal had the highest COVID-19 vaccination rate in Europe having administered 272.78 doses per 100 people in the country, while Malta had administered 258.49 doses per 100. The UK was the first country in Europe to approve the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine for widespread use and began inoculations on December 8, 2020, and so far have administered 224.04 doses per 100. At the latest data, Belgium had carried out 253.89 doses of vaccines per 100 population. Russia became the first country in the world to authorize a vaccine - named Sputnik V - for use in the fight against COVID-19 in August 2020. As of August 4, 2022, Russia had administered 127.3 doses per 100 people in the country.

The seven-day rate of cases across Europe shows an ongoing perspective of which countries are worst affected by the virus relative to their population. For further information about the coronavirus pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

As global communities responded to COVID-19, we heard from public health officials that the same type of aggregated, anonymized insights we use in products such as Google Maps would be helpful as they made critical decisions to combat COVID-19. These Community Mobility Reports aimed to provide insights into what changed in response to policies aimed at combating COVID-19. The reports charted movement trends over time by geography, across different categories of places such as retail and recreation, groceries and pharmacies, parks, transit stations, workplaces, and residential.

The project had Four Research Stages

Stage 1 – Global Mapping Exercise Aim: Map and develop typologies of the pandemic’s impact on the food/education/play-leisure nexus, with a focus on young people’s vulnerabilities globally, based on an international, integrative review of research and policy literatures. Stage 2: – National and Regional Mapping (Brazil, South Africa, UK) Aim: Examine key impacts of pandemic-related policy on young people’s access to and adaptations around food, education and play/leisure at the national, regional and local scale. Stage 3: Zooming in on local adaptations of young people in monetary-poor households Aim: In-depth research with professional stakeholders and young people in each case study region, with a focus on incremental and innovative strategies and the impact of those adaptations on everyday survival and recovery. In England, this research took place in Birmingham and the West Midlands. In total, we worked with 87 young people, using qualitative methods such as interviews and visual mapping. The research was co-produced with young people: we worked with a core group of ten young people from Birmingham City Council’s Youth Voice team, who co-designed some of the methods, undertook peer research with some of the young people in our sample, and co-analysed data. Stage 4: Co-design of solutions to foster young people’s recovery and resilience Aim: Co-design solutions with our community of young people and key professionals that will help vulnerable young people to recover and be prepared in the eventuality of future major health and socio-economic crises. In England, this process took place in Birmingham and the West Midlands and involved the same core group discussing the project’s main findings. Through a series of workshops, young people’s recommendations were created and tested with us and a selected group of professional stakeholders.

Stage 1 - Interviews with key organisations working in the food/education/play sector and with children and youth.

The team conducted 32 interviews with key organisations between February and June 2023. The aim was to situate and identify what had been the key impacts of pandemic-related policy towards the food, education, play/leisure nexus of issues facing young people during and after COVID-19, in England. It also sought to examine what policy/programmes/initiatives were developed, and how local places mattered (including home life/household contexts). To do so, we identified representatives from a range of organisations that played a key role in supporting young people and/ or in assessing the impacts of the pandemic on them.

Sampling was done through desk-based research based on a review of national and regional review of the literature and reports and further on snowballing, we identified non-governmental and non-profit organisations that played a key contribution in supporting young people and/or assessing the impact and repercussions of the pandemic on them. Selection of the interviews was made either through their role across the country or because of their contribution at regional and city levels. The number of 30 was considered as commensurate with the methods used in similarly-sized comparative projects of similar scale. This included representatives from the following types of organisations:

• Charities (incl. Foundations and Think-Tanks) working either across England or in specific English regions, and specialized in the following sectors: food education, food policy, food provision (including food banks) and healthy food; education provision, education and digital technology, education policy, education and youth, social mobility and educational disadvantage; play provision, play policy; support to disadvantaged and vulnerable young people. • Not-for profit social enterprises focusing on youth education, youth employment, food and nutrition. • Schools/Colleges. • Private Companies specialized in supporting education organisations and play provision. • Research Institutions with specific expertise in education, food and health and children/young people. • Local and Combined Authorities. • Diocesan and Faith groups. • National networks representing community organisations in the faith and play sector. • Young People Ambassadors.

While looking at England as a whole, we also zoomed on West Midlands/Birmingham. The West Midlands was one of the hardest-hit parts of the UK during COVID-19. The region includes some of the most deprived neighbourhoods and a younger than average population. The intent of the interviews was twofold: 1) to understand each organisation’s response to supporting young people during/after COVID-19, and 2) from the organisation’s views, to identify what adaptations and tactics young people used to deal with the challenges that COVID-19 and associated lockdowns presented. Interview questions focused on the following themes: The role of the organisation and how they engaged with young people, the impact of the pandemic of the food/ education/play-leisure nexus, the connection between vulnerability, place, social networks and adaptation, the legacy of Covid-19 and the importance of the cost of living crisis. All interviews were recorded, and our research fully conformed with UCL’s ethical guidance. The interviews were transcribed, coded and analysed, with 37 core themes extracted.

Stage 2 - Interviews with Young People

Aim: In-depth research with professional stakeholders and young people in the West Midlands with a focus on incremental and innovative strategies and the impact of those adaptations on everyday survival and recovery.

In total, we worked with 89 young people, aged 10-24. The research was co-produced with young people: we worked with a core group of ten young people from Birmingham City Council’s Youth Voice team, who co-designed some of the methods, undertook peer research with some of the young people in our sample, and co-analysed data. Data archived relates to interviews with young people conducted by the Panex Youth Research Fellow.

Young people were recruited from a range of settings across the case study region. Predominantly, young people were recruited from youth groups, youth centres and schools. Sampling was done based on age, gender, ethnicity, status (i.e. student or in employment), place of living.

While not ‘representative’, per se, this has ensured coverage of a range of different living conditions and (along with working with established schools networks and NGOs in each region) enable recruitment of young people. This was commensurate with the methods used in similarly-sized comparative projects working with youth (Kraftl et al., 2019) and enables sampling for diverse youth while again not seeking ‘representativeness’ in this qualitative study. The main methods for this strand of research were interviews and visual web discussions conducted through workshops between June 2023 and May 2024 Some activities were not recorded and transcribed, for example the workshops done with 32 primary school pupils nor the other workshops done with young people. Owing to the impossibility of anonymising the mapping exercise and visual webs (which were intensely personal in nature and showed data about young people’s homes, schools and workplaces), we cannot deposit these data. We have not taken this decision lightly but this is the only way that we can conform to our project’s ethical principles.

Network metrics for USA, UK, and China, pre-COVID and COVID.