Iraq Conflict Has Killed A Million Iraqis: Survey

Published on Thursday, January 31, 2008 by Reuters

LONDON - More than one million Iraqis have died as a result of the
conflict in their country since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003,
according to research conducted by one of Britain's leading polling
groups.

The survey, conducted by Opinion Research Business (ORB) with 2,414
adults in face-to-face interviews, found that 20 percent of people had
had at least one death in their household as a result of the conflict,
rather than natural causes.

The last complete census in Iraq conducted in 1997 found 4.05 million
households in the country, a figure ORB used to calculate that
approximately 1.03 million people had died as a result of the war, the
researchers found.

The margin of error in the survey, conducted in August and September
2007, was 1.7 percent, giving a range of deaths of 946,258 to 1.12
million.

ORB originally found that 1.2 million people had died, but decided to
go back and conduct more research in rural areas to make the survey as
comprehensive as possible and then came up with the revised figure.

The research covered 15 of Iraq's 18 provinces. Those that not covered
included two of Iraq's more volatile regions ' Kerbala and Anbar ' and
the northern province of Arbil, where local authorities refused them a
permit to work.

Estimates of deaths in Iraq have been highly controversial in the past.

Medical journal The Lancet published a peer-reviewed report in 2004
stating that there had been 100,000 more deaths than would normally be
expected since the March 2003 invasion, kicking off a storm of protest.

The widely watched Web site Iraq Body Count currently estimates that
between 80,699 and 88,126 people have died in the conflict, although
its methodology and figures have also been questioned by U.S.
authorities and others.

ORB, a non-government-funded group founded in 1994, conducts research
for the private, public and voluntary sectors.

The director of the group, Allan Hyde, said it had no objective other
than to record as accurately as possible the number of deaths among the
Iraqi population as a result of the invasion and ensuing conflict.

Reporting by Luke Baker; editing by Andrew Roche