Another Lancet lot

According to the latest Pentagon assessment, in late-2006 the Iraq bloodbath worsened considerably:

Weekly attacks in Iraq rose to more than 1000 during the period and average daily casualties increased to more than 140, with Iraqi civilians bearing the brunt of the violence — nearly 100 killed or wounded a day, according to statistics in the Pentagon’s latest quarterly report on security in Iraq.

Lancet-sceptics might like to note that:

Those figures may represent as little as half the true casualties because they include only violence observed by or reported to the US-led military coalition, the report acknowledged.

It cited a United Nations estimate, based on hospital reports, that more than 6000 Iraqi civilians were killed or wounded in December alone.

And we already know how reliable are data from the battered Iraqi health system.