Worldwide mortality experience since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2024) shows excess deaths over that period in almost every country measured. Australia (+6%) was below average, and New Zealand (+0.1%) the lowest we measured.

Covid-19 mortality was at a similar level in 2024 as 2023, contrary to our prediction of a reduction in mortality rates.

You can see a very high level view of mortality rates over the last decade in this graph, which shows the standardised (for age and sex) mortality rate in each calendar year since 2015.

Lucrezia Borgia's hair ( and possibly her rings?) are in a museum in Milan

The table below shows all major causes of deaths for the eleven months to November 2024, with the overall picture showing 1,400 more deaths than our prediction, all of which is explained by the extra deaths from Covid-19.

The overall pattern of mortality for the year is shown in this graph, with almost all weeks within the 95% prediction interval, but winter deaths generally higher than projected.

The next graph shows the pattern of deaths from Covid-19 in 2024 compared with 2023, also showing the 2023 waves shifted to be at the same time as 2024 to make the comparison easier to see.

This graph shows the Covid deaths from and with Covid-19 for 2022, 2023 and 2024, and our predicted level of deaths from Covid-19 during 2024. We had projected two waves of Covid-19 during 2024, both lower than 2023, but instead they were fairly similar.

And my fiction highlight this year was The City and the City, by China Miéville.

I found this book via all the city builders I’ve been following on social media, yet it is fiction. It is a police procedural set in two cities in the same geographical space, separated, but yet intertwined.

I love a good general history - this was my favourite this year. How the World made the West, by Josephine Quinn

Quinn wrote this book to refute the idea that the only early societies worth studying to explain our own are the ancient Greeks and Romans. It's also a fascinating history on its own.

I read a lot about cities this year - this was the best. Age of the City, by Ian Goldin and Tom Lee-Devlin

This book is a broad history of the city, and why urbanisation continues to be an unstoppable force around the planet. It finishes by suggesting ways of improving any city.

My favourite: How Big Things Get Done, by Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner

Flyvbjerg and his coauthor Gardner use their experience and analysis of all decades of projects to take out a pithy set of lessons about how best to make big projects work as intended.

The table shows that mortality from Covid-19 and respiratory diseases have all been above our predicted levels for the year to August, while deaths from most other diseases have been slightly below our prediction. 5/x

Total deaths from all causes have, in aggregate, been higher than our prediction in the 8 months to August 2024. Actual weekly deaths have nearly always been within the 95% confidence interval. However, most weeks in June, July and August were above the prediction. 4/x

Other deaths from respiratory illnesses have also been worse than expected, with all other mortality in line with predictions to date. 3/x

Our graph shows the waves of actual and projected deaths from and with Covid since December 2021 in Australia

The table shows some of this in more detail.