1. Are individuals subjected to Covid vaccine mandates being counted in unemployment figures? If not, how are the number of people out work because of mandates being tracked? 2. Is the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) tracking deaths by vaccinated status – given it is being recorded on the Australian immunisation register it is possible to do? 3. If so, could the ABS please provide a line-by-line breakout of 2021 deaths by vaccinated versus unvaccinated deaths (personal details other than age can be excluded)? Can the detail include date of death and date of last vaccination? 4. Can the ABS provide a breakout of non-specific causes for 2021 deaths by item code? 5. Why isn’t the ABS comparing 2021 data to 2020 data rather than 2015-2019 given those years were pre-Covid conditions?

Question Number: 69
PDR Number: SBE069
Date Submitted: 16/11/2022
Department or Body: Australian Bureau of Statistics

1. People who have lost a job will be reflected in ABS unemployment figures, as measured by the Labour Force Survey. The survey does not ask people about their vaccination status or requirements to be vaccinated.

2. The ABS does not track deaths by vaccination status.

3. Not applicable.

4. Causes of death for every code in the International Classification of Diseases, 10th Revision (ICD-10) are available in the ‘data downloads’ section of Causes of Death, Australia, 2021. Datacube 1 provides this information for underlying causes of death for all deaths registered in 2021. See: www.abs.gov.au/statistics/health/causes-death/causes-deathaustralia/2021#data-download

5. The ABS compares numbers of death for a year against a baseline average (e.g. 2015- 2019) to serve as a proxy for the expected number of deaths. Comparisons against baseline counts can indicate whether mortality is higher or lower than expected. 2020 is not included in any baseline comparison as the number of deaths was significantly lower than expected. All deaths for individual years are presented in the datacubes attached to the publication so annual comparisons can be made by users. The ABS explains this in the ‘baseline comparisons’ section of Provisional Mortality Statistics, available at www.abs.gov.au/statistics/health/causes-death/provisional-mortality-statistics/latest-release.