Media Coverage of Violent Deaths in Iraq: An Opportunistic Capture-Recapture Assessment

Abstract

Introduction:Western media coverage of the violence associated with the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq has contrasted in magnitude and nature with population-based survey reports.Objectives:The purpose of this study was to evaluate the extent to which first-hand reports of violent deaths were captured in the English language media by conducting in-depth interviews with Iraqi citizens.Methods:The England-based Iraq Body Count (IBC) has methodically monitored media reports and recorded each violent death in Iraq that could be confirmed by two English language media sources. Using the capturerecapture method, 25 Masters' Degree students were assigned to interview residents in Iraq and asked them to describe 10 violent deaths that occurred closest to their home since the 2003 invasion. Students then matched these reports with those documented in IBC. These reports were matched both individually and crosschecked in groups to obtain a percentage of those deaths captured in the English language media.Results:Eighteen out of 25 students successfully interviewed someone in Iraq. Six contacted individuals by telephone, while the others conducted interviews via e-mail. One out of seven (14%) phone contacts refused to participate. Seventeen out of 18 primary interviewees resided in Baghdad, however, some interviewees reported deaths of neighbors that occurred while the neighbors were elsewhere. The Baghdad residents reported 161 deaths in total, 39 of which (24%) were believed to be reported in the press as summarized by IBC. An additional 13 deaths (8%) might have been in the database, and 61 (38%) were absolutely not in the database.Conclusions:The vast majority of violent deaths (estimated from the results of this study as being between 68–76%) are not reported by the press. Efforts to monitor events by press coverage or reports of tallies similar to those reported in the press, should be evaluated with the suspicion applied to any passive surveillance network: that it may be incomplete. Even in the most heavily reported conflicts, the media may miss the majority of violent events.

Challenges with Disaster Mortality Data and Measuring Progress Towards the Implementation of the Sendai Framework

“…To improve reliability, when multiple surveys or samples are carried out and there is enough information to link individuals across such surveys, 2017capture-recapture analysis can be undertaken to provide an overall estimate of disaster mortality. The only example found applied in the context of a disaster was carried out in Iraq to assess the extent to which first-hand reports of violent deaths associated with the 2003 invasion of Iraq were captured in the English language media, finding that 68-76% were not reported by the press, although this fell to 22% for deaths in more recent years with a lower impact of recall bias (Siegler 2008).…”

WikiLeaks and Iraq Body Count: the Sum of Parts May Not Add Up to the Whole—A Comparison of Two Tallies of Iraqi Civilian Deaths

“…12 The analysis provided here should instead act as a cautionary note for scholars attempting to draw population-wide conclusions from convenience samples such as IBC. 12 The analysis provided here should instead act as a cautionary note for scholars attempting to draw population-wide conclusions from convenience samples such as IBC.…”

“…Reports that might only potentially match to the morgue tallies that were in IBC (IBC contained morgue tallies with no information about the individuals included therein) were given a score of 0 or 1 based on the reviewers’ judgment. Previous evidence suggests that most violent deaths in Baghdad did not go to a morgue 12 An unintended natural experiment occurred when the War Logs file was imported into a US version of Excel.…”

The Physics of God and the Quantum Gravity Theory of Everything

“…3.2: "Treatment of inconsistencies in reporting"]; the maximum figure in the range does not represent the maximum number of actual fatal Iraqi civilian casualties due to violence. Because of this, the IBC can provide an absolute minimum bound which is known to be far lower than the actual lethal casualty numbers [384], but by itself it can otherwise say nothing about the actual death toll. Thus, the IBC's figures are quite consistent with the 2006 Lancet paper.…”