The life expectancy rate in the U.S. has dropped by one year, that’s the most it’s dropped since World War II. According to the CDC the average life span in the US is now 77.8 years compared to 78.8 in 2019. LSU Health New Orleans Chief of Community and Population Medicine Dr. Benjamin Springgate said the COVID pandemic is the main reason for the decrease.
“Not only have we seen the overall life expectancy drop by a year but in those populations such as African Americans and Hispanics, who have higher death rates we’ve seen we’ve seen the life expectancy rates drop even more,” said Springgate.
The average life span for Blacks dropped 2.7 years to 72 and for Hispanics a decrease of 1.9 years to 79.9. The drop for Caucasians is .8 years to 78.
The pandemic began to take hold last spring in the US and Springgate said the numbers used to determine the current life expectancy rate are not from the entire year.
“This was data for the first half of 2020, so what that shows us is that there’s a potential that once all of the data are accounted for 2020, the numbers might even be worse,” said Springgate.
With the larger decreases in life expectancies among Blacks and Hispanics in the US and Springgate said it is very concerning about minorities and the pandemic.
“What we see is that the people who had the fewest available health resources, people who are working frontline jobs, with few protections, were more likely to die,” said Springgate.
Springgate said statistics indicate while the US makes up only four percent of the global population but 20-percent of the COVID deaths suggests that the US is not handling the pandemic as well as other nations.
Comments