There's a new theory regarding the origins of the "died suddenly" phenomenon.

Some have attributed an increase in mysterious deaths to confirmation bias and overreporting. In other words, these deaths were always happening, but they are only being reported on now in the current news cycle.

Others believe the deaths are the result of the COVID-19 vaccine, which has caused extremely rare, yet often serious, side effects -- including myocarditis.

This new theory, however, suggests the cause is not vaccine-related.

Yet, if true, it would still be the result of policies promoted by leftists and Democrats.

(The following theory, along with many others, was covered at length in The Western Journal's Deep Dive into the "Died Suddenly" phenomenon. Consider subscribing to The Western Journal to see more content like this).

According to a Jan. 11 Wall Street Journal Op-Ed, "excess deaths" during the pandemic far "exceeded the number of deaths attributed to COVID," and, unlike COVID deaths, that number continues to remain high.

"The CDC data show the rate of non-COVID excess deaths in the first half of 2022 was even higher than 2020 or 2021. These deaths therefore likely already exceed 250,000, disproportionately among young adults. We are witnessing multiple healthcare emergencies, but resources and attention are still directed toward COVID," the Op-Ed's two authors, Rob Arnott and Casey B. Mulligan, wrote.

According to Arnott and Mulligan, researchers at the National Bureau of Economic Research, this was due to lockdown effects such as homicides, accidents, alcohol deaths and conditions caused by weight gain.

These deaths have carried forward into 2021 and 2022 and, according to the Op-Ed, "seem unlikely to recede soon."

"If the pandemic response had to involve wholesale disruption of ordinary life, the public-health community should have been actively monitoring its effects on the millions of Americans we knew suffered from drug addiction, diabetes and many other potentially lethal health conditions," the two authors wrote.

"No time is too soon to acknowledge and begin to alleviate the collateral damage from COVID policies."

Although many experts have their theories on what exactly is causing the "died suddenly" phenomenon, no one is for sure.

According to doctors Vinay Prasad and John Mandrola, a hematologist-oncologist and cardiologist respectively, the "died suddenly" phenomenon is extremely concerning, albeit impossible to as of yet diagnose.

In an article for The Free Press, a new media company founded by journalist Bari Weiss, the two doctors relayed their concerns over the COVID vaccine, the purported sudden spate of deaths and the latter's possible causes.

"[W]e don’t know anything about how many of the heart-related deaths of the past two years can be attributed to vaccines, as opposed to the harms of lockdown, or multiple other causes," Prasad and Mandrola wrote.

"To establish this would require painstaking statistical work. Moreover, the best efforts would have to take advantage of what are known as natural experiments -- that is, variations that have occurred between otherwise comparable groups for essentially random events. Economists make a living looking for such events, and their skills are desperately needed here."

This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.