I am suspicious of the "celebrity" deaths coming back to pre-covid levels since a similar drop was not documented by the "deaths of famous people". I did not compile the total deaths for the central U.S. states for 2024, and when I looked at my spreadsheet, I wasn't sure which states I used anyway :) I think the point is that the death rate is still higher than pre-covid, but may have come down from the rates of last year. The U.S. total is still not available from the Federal site, and I think they don't have numbers past 2020, which suggests to me they are trying to hide things.