THEIR MISTAKE

Missouri Didn’t Count Dozens of COVID-19 Deaths

The state is blaming a data glitch.

Missouri failed to count dozens of coronavirus deaths due to what it’s calling a data glitch. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that the state has now added 77 fatalities to the tally, bringing the total to 1,639. A health department spokeswoman cited a “data coding problem” for the undercount, adding that the issue—discovered during a review of the data and death certificates—has now been resolved. Most of the uncounted deaths were from June, July, and August, but new numbers released today show that Missouri’s COVID-19 surge is not over; it reported 1,987 new cases on Saturday, it's second-highest one-day count.