The average U.S. life expectancy saw its largest drop in at least 40 years in 2020, thanks to the coronavirus pandemic. Researchers from the University of Southern California and Princeton University now project that life expectancy decreased by 1.13 years in 2020, bringing it to 77.48 years, after the coronavirus took the lives of more than 300,000 Americans.
What’s more, the researchers predicted even larger declines in 2020 among Black and Latino communities, which have been hit particularly hard by COVID-19. The study projected that life expectancy for Black people will drop by 2.1 years, to 72.78 years, and that life expectancy for Latino people will drop by 3.05 years, to 78.77 years. In contrast, the life expectancy for white people is projected to decline by 0.68 years to 77.84 years.
The authors blamed economic factors for a disproportionate decrease in life expectancy.
“These groups are more likely than Whites to hold low-paying jobs with little autonomy, often in industries that have suffered the largest job losses during the pandemic, creating exceptionally high unemployment rates for both groups and likely loss of health insurance,” they wrote.
The study was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
