Came across an interesting idea while reading this article from the ECDC (European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control). Instead of measuring the severity of H1N1 in terms of number of deaths (which, by anyone’s count, it less than expected even for seasonal flu), let’s measure it in terms of the numbers of life-years lost:

…there has been some confusion between what is meant by ‘mild’: the disease being mild epidemiologically, as opposed to mild at the individual level.

Because the virus has mainly targeted younger people than seasonal flu, measuring the severity in terms of life-years lost, rather than the number of deaths, would give a more accurate picture of how severe the pandemic is in reality, suggests Ekdahl.

What do you think? Should we be counting deaths equally—a life is a life? Or is there something to the idea that the death of a young person is more tragic, somehow weighs upon us differently than the death of the elderly? Which strikes you as a worse illness: one that kills more folks overall, but the median age of death is quite elderly, say 83; or one that kills fewer folks overall but many more younger folks, including children, and the median age of death is say, 53?