The impact that the Covid pandemic had on Finland's overall mortality rate was minor, according to the Institute for Health and Welfare (THL).
Citing data compiled by the EU-funded mortality tracker EuroMomo, THL said Finland saw a minor increase in excess mortality during the pandemic. Similar scenarios were also seen in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Ireland and Luxembourg.
EuroMomo examined mortality data between early 2020 and the spring of 2023, a period that saw four waves of the pandemic.
Excess mortality is an unusual increase in mortality during a given period.
THL's research professor Tuija Leino told news service STT that the data suggests that Finland's pandemic-era restrictions were effective and adhered to.
During the first waves of the Covid pandemic, Finland's personal distancing rules helped to prevent future deaths among the elderly, as other viruses were not circulating in the population, according to the health agency. When the Covid restrictions were lifted, other illnesses began circulating and mortality started rising.
THL noted that Finland has a high proportion of very elderly people in its population. They are often frail, and mortality among that group during the pandemic was particularly high. It is likely that even if the pandemic did not occur, some of them would have died during the same period from some other infection.
During Covid's initial wave, Sweden had higher death rates, according to THL. But in the later, less severe waves, Sweden's excess deaths were about the same as Finland's and Norway's
The European countries with the highest mortality rates during Covid included Greece, Hungary and Italy, where pandemic-related deaths were overall many times higher than in Finland.
At the European level, only the first two Covid waves caused more excess mortality than influenza usually prompts, according to THL.
