Independent estimate of Gaza deaths is higher than official figures

About 75,000 people in the Gaza Strip – 3.6% of the population – died of violent causes between October 7, 2023 and January 5, 2025, according to an independent study based on a household survey. It is greater than the estimate of 46,000 violent deaths during this period by the Gaza Ministry of Health.

The study also estimates that there have been nearly 9,000 more violent deaths during this period than expected normally in the Gaza Strip. This is the very first estimate of indirect deaths due to war in the region which began in October 2023.

The study is based on interviews with 2,000 households selected at random, with people invited to list all household members before the war, then on the current situation. “We were in fact in the field and we collected data directly from the population,” explains Debarati Guha-Sapir at the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium.

Although the team has not been able to access certain areas due to the ongoing fights and Israeli evacuation orders, this gap would probably lead to an underestimation rather than a overestimation, according to the researchers.

Guha-Sapir says that the Gaza Ministry of Health has strict criteria to count deaths. For example, this does not have the deaths in which no bodies were found, like people who have been buried in tunnels. She therefore thinks that the estimate of her team is closer to the real number.

Another independent study published in February concluded that the number of deaths on June 24, 2024 was higher than official figures by a similar proportion. However, the sources used in this study included an online survey and social media necrologies, so Guha-Sapir thinks that the approach of his team is more reliable.

Francesco checki at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, whose team carried out the February study, does not agree. “The investigation is not necessarily more precise than our study,” he says. But Guha-Sapir’s study is more up to date and also includes indirect deaths, says Checki. “As such, it has a more complete image of mortality.”

The estimate of around 9,000 indirect deaths following the war is lower than certain previous suggestions. In fact, in a letter Lancet In 2024, three researchers said on the basis of what happened in other conflicts that there could be four indirect deaths for each direct death in Gaza, and therefore that the number of deaths at the time could reach 186,000.

But this ratio of indirect deaths to direct directors was only observed in countries like Sudan where there was extreme poverty and mediocre health care before the start of conflicts, explains Guha-Sapir. It is a mistake to apply it to Gaza, where the situation was different from that of Sudan before the start of the war, she said.

However, if the conflict continues, it could still change. “While the conditions deteriorate, non -violent deaths could soon increase rapidly,” said Michael Spagat, member of the team at Royal Holloway University in London.