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Jennifer Lang

@actuarialeye.bsky.social
385 followers 497 following 96 posts

Sydney based actuary and director looking at the world through an actuarial eye. Lots of statistics, often feminist. She/her

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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 02/12/2025
Worldwide mortality experience since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2024) shows excess deaths over that period in almost every country measured. Australia (+6%) was below average, and New Zealand (+0.1%) the lowest we measured.
Graph showing excess mortality for the period 2020-2024 in 40 selected countries across the globe.
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 02/12/2025
Covid-19 mortality was at a similar level in 2024 as 2023, contrary to our prediction of a reduction in mortality rates.
Graph showing mortality rates in Australia from December 2019 to December 2024, with waves of high mortality roughly every six months, and the 2024 mortality rates higher than the predicted line of reduction since 2023.
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 02/12/2025
You can see a very high level view of mortality rates over the last decade in this graph, which shows the standardised (for age and sex) mortality rate in each calendar year since 2015.
Graph of standardised mortality rates showing the line of average improvement 2015-2019, and showing that all mortality rates from 2021 onwards were significantly higher than the line assuming improvement continued from 2015, with 2022 furthest away from the line.
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 29/05/2025
Lucrezia Borgia's hair ( and possibly her rings?) are in a museum in Milan
Lock of hair in a glass case on top of a stand with jewelled rings and lockets
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 22/03/2025
The table below shows all major causes of deaths for the eleven months to November 2024, with the overall picture showing 1,400 more deaths than our prediction, all of which is explained by the extra deaths from Covid-19.
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 22/03/2025
The overall pattern of mortality for the year is shown in this graph, with almost all weeks within the 95% prediction interval, but winter deaths generally higher than projected.
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 22/03/2025
The next graph shows the pattern of deaths from Covid-19 in 2024 compared with 2023, also showing the 2023 waves shifted to be at the same time as 2024 to make the comparison easier to see.
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 22/03/2025
This graph shows the Covid deaths from and with Covid-19 for 2022, 2023 and 2024, and our predicted level of deaths from Covid-19 during 2024. We had projected two waves of Covid-19 during 2024, both lower than 2023, but instead they were fairly similar.
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 13/01/2025
And my fiction highlight this year was The City and the City, by China Miéville. I found this book via all the city builders I’ve been following on social media, yet it is fiction. It is a police procedural set in two cities in the same geographical space, separated, but yet intertwined.
Book Cover for The City and The City, by China Miéville
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 13/01/2025
I love a good general history - this was my favourite this year. How the World made the West, by Josephine Quinn Quinn wrote this book to refute the idea that the only early societies worth studying to explain our own are the ancient Greeks and Romans. It's also a fascinating history on its own.
Book Cover for How the World made the West, a 4,000 year history, by Josephine Quinn
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 13/01/2025
I read a lot about cities this year - this was the best. Age of the City, by Ian Goldin and Tom Lee-Devlin This book is a broad history of the city, and why urbanisation continues to be an unstoppable force around the planet. It finishes by suggesting ways of improving any city.
Book Cover for Age of the City, Why our Future will be won or Lost together, by Ian Goldin and Tom Lee-Devlin
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 13/01/2025
My favourite: How Big Things Get Done, by Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner Flyvbjerg and his coauthor Gardner use their experience and analysis of all decades of projects to take out a pithy set of lessons about how best to make big projects work as intended.
Cover of the book How Big things get done, the surprising factors behind every successful project form Home Renovations to Space Exploration, by Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 19/12/2024
The table shows that mortality from Covid-19 and respiratory diseases have all been above our predicted levels for the year to August, while deaths from most other diseases have been slightly below our prediction. 5/x
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 19/12/2024
Total deaths from all causes have, in aggregate, been higher than our prediction in the 8 months to August 2024. Actual weekly deaths have nearly always been within the 95% confidence interval. However, most weeks in June, July and August were above the prediction. 4/x
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 19/12/2024
Other deaths from respiratory illnesses have also been worse than expected, with all other mortality in line with predictions to date. 3/x
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 02/12/2024
Our graph shows the waves of actual and projected deaths from and with Covid since December 2021 in Australia
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Jennifer Lang @actuarialeye.bsky.social · 03/11/2024
The table shows some of this in more detail.
Table showing the detailed break down of deaths in Australia for 2024 year to June, actual and predicted. There were 92,000 deaths in the first six months, 1,600 more deaths than predicted.
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