Typical, interesting topic raised by ttr, illicited a response from a GUEST poster that provided some examples of how reported and actual figures may diverge and how sources reporting deaths should be viewed with care. Now because this second post could possibly be read as being "pro-MNF", which it is not, if anything it is extremely neutral, it merely points out that the the world's Press are not above creating sensational stories where in fact none exist, we get the attempted sarcastic "piss-take" by CG, that attacks Guest's post without challenging any of the examples stated and adds absolutely nothing the point of discussion raised by ttr.

From the article linked to the original post:
"The Associated Press count for last year, assembled from its daily dispatches, is roughly 13,700 civilians, police and soldiers. But the news service has said that it believes its figures are substantially lower than the actual number of deaths because it lacked access to government data. Iraq Body Count, a British-based research group that reports on civilian deaths in Iraq, says the number is at most roughly 58,000 since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

The group relies on deaths reported by the news media, and suggests on its Web site that its totals are an underrepresentation because "many if not most civilian casualties will go unreported." Critics have accused the group of grossly underreporting Iraqi deaths.

A study on Iraqi mortality rates published in October by the Lancet medical journal estimated that more than 600,000 Iraqis had died from violence since the invasion. That number was extrapolated from population surveys rather than a compilation of actual deaths. The U.S. and Iraqi governments, as well as Iraq Body Count, dismissed the Lancet findings as inaccurate."

I believe that the main cause is very well indicated in the The Washington Post's article as the AP figure of 13,700 roughly agrees with the 13,896 reported by Iraq's ministries of defense, health and interior. But those are only the deaths caused by "political/sectarian" violence. IraqBodyCount, literally, minute by minute provides two sets of figures showing a least and worse case, but they complain of "unreported" deaths, but it should be remembered that they too restrict themselves to deaths caused by "political/sectarian" violence.

The Iraqi Ministry of Health issued a second figure for deaths of just under 23,000 for 2006 while the UN reported 28,000 deaths for the period Jan to October. So where do the differences come in:

- Difference between casualties reported and deaths reported
- The lower figures (13,700 and 13,896) are those actually killed in reported incidents (i.e. the deaths), in incidents involving roadside bombs and car bombs there are many people injured, a number of those casualties die days after the incident and those deaths are not attributed to any incident and by and large go unreported
- The larger figure (22,950) supplied by the Iraq Health Ministry includes all deaths (Natural causes, Road deaths, Accidental death, Criminal deaths) so they should be higher than those figures made up of only those attributed to "political/sectarian" violence.

It should also be pointed out, as it is not clear from the The Washington Post's article the Lancet (John Hopkins Study) and IraqBodyCount figures start from the beginning of the 2003 invasion of Iraq.