WARNING: Political Thread

[Eric5273]

Here's the complete article from that study I posted about yesterday:

Critics say 600,000 Iraqi dead doesn't tally
But pollsters defend methods used in Johns Hopkins study


The study, funded by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, drew on data obtained by eight Iraqi physicians during a survey of 1,849 Iraqi families -- or 12,801 people -- in 47 neighborhoods of 18 regions across the entire country.

The researchers said they based the selection of geographical areas on population size, not on the level of violence.

Then they projected the findings to the 26.1 million Iraqis estimated to be living in the survey areas.

The surveyors put Iraq's prewar mortality rate at 5.5 deaths per 1,000 people per year. In the post-invasion period, according to the survey, the rate grew to 13.3 deaths per 1,000 people per year. The surveyors used the difference between these rates to calculate deaths that were not brought on by natural causes. The survey suggests that of more than 650,000 Iraqis who died since 2003, 601,000 were killed since the war began. Polling experts supported the methods used by the surveyors.

"The sampling is solid. The methodology is as good as it gets," said John Zogby, whose Utica, N.Y.-based polling agency, Zogby International, has done several surveys in Iraq since the war began. "It is what people in the statistics business do."

Zogby said similar survey methods have been used to estimate casualty figures in other conflicts, such as Darfur and the Democratic People's Republic of Congo.

Ronald Waldman, an epidemiologist at Columbia University who worked at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for many years, told the Washington Post the survey method was "tried and true." He said that "this is the best estimate of mortality we have."
Frank Harrell Jr., chairman of the biostatistics department at Vanderbilt University, told the Associated Press the study incorporated "rigorous, well-justified analysis of the data."