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36,000 Missing Deaths: Tracking the True Toll of the Coronavirus Crisis - The New York Times

www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/21/world/coronavirus-missing-deaths.html

What Jamie wrote

The death counts for COVID-19 you are reading are most definitely undercounted. It is really only a question of how much.

But the total death numbers offer a more complete portrait of the pandemic, experts say, especially because most countries report only those Covid-19 deaths that occur in hospitals.

Looking at divergence from "normal" is probably the best way. The Economist has a similar analysis Tracking Covid-19 Excess Deaths as well.