Pandemic helped cause biggest drop in US life expectancy since WWII, study finds

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A new study estimates that life expectancy in the United States decreased by nearly two years from 2018 to 2020, pg primarily due to the coronavirus pandemic, marking the largest drop since World War II.

The study, published this week in the medical journal The BMJ, estimates that from 2018 to 2020, average life expectancy in the U.S. decreased by 1.87 years, from 79 to 77.

That marks the greatest drop in life expectancy in the U.S. since 1943, during World War II, and is 8.5 times the average loss seen when compared to 16 other high-income countries, according to the study. Life expectancy is a statistical measure of the average time a baby born today is expected to live.

"This study shows that the gap in life expectancy in the U.S. increased markedly between 2018 and 2020," the authors wrote. "The conditions that produced a US health disadvantages before the arrival of COVID-19 are still in place, but the predominant cause for this large decline was the COVID-19 pandemic: in 2020, all cause mortality in the US increased by 23%. "

The study also found "large differences" in life expectancy based on race and ethnicity. On average, from 2018 to 2020, the drop in life expectancy was 3.25 years for Black people and 3.88 years for Hispanic people, compared to 1.36 years for white people, the study found.

"Progress since 2010 in reducing the gap in life expectancy in the US between Black and white people was erased in 2018-20; life expectancy in Black men reached its lowest level since 1998 (67.73 years), and the longstanding Hispanic life expectancy advantage almost disappeared," the authors wrote.