Why Are So Many People Dying In Italy

The Word Of The Days Is "COMORBIDITY" 

Of all the locations with clusters of kung flu infections, Italy is the most active. Astonishingly so, with (as of 3/22/2020 @ 12:13 PM Eastern Daylight Time Z-4) 53,578 confirmed cases, and 4825 deaths. (As always, go to the Johns Hopkins COVID-19 Dashboard for up to date numbers.)  

There was a story yesterday asking this very question in The Telegraph. They identified several things that might be contributing to this: 

• Demographics: Italy is, on average, a country full of old people. According to the CIA World Factbook, Italy is the 5th oldest country in the world. We know that COVID-19 is more likely to cause death in older people. 
• Comorbidity, that is, association with other diseases: Italy's aging population, as well as being old, also has lots of old people with heart disease, COPD, long histories of smoking, high blood pressure, and diabetes. 
• There's a geographic factor here as well: most of the deaths are coming from heavily industrial Lombardy, which also has a long history of bad airpollution. 
• The most interesting one is that the Italian National Institute of Health thinks cause of death is being over-identified as COVID-19. This one is sure to start an argument in the comments, but heres the direct quote: 

“On re-evaluation by the National Institute of Health, only 12 per cent of death certificates have shown a direct causality from coronavirus, while 88 per cent of patients who have died have at least one pre-morbidity - many had two or three,” he says. 

GO READ THE WHOLE THING.