Years of Life Lost Associated With COVID-19 Deaths in the USA During the First 2 Years of the Pandemic

Authors

Troy Quast
Ross Andel
Sean Gregory
Eric A Storch

Publication Date

8-25-2022

Journal

Journal of Public Health

DOI

10.1093/pubmed/fdac057

PMID

35640260

PMCID

PMC9213874

PubMedCentral® Posted Date

5-30-2022

PubMedCentral® Full Text Version

Post-print

Published Open-Access

yes

Keywords

COVID-19, Humans, Life Expectancy, Pandemics, Public Health, United States, infectious disease, mortality

Abstract

Background: Prior estimates of the years of life lost (YLLs) in the USA associated with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) were 1.2 million through 11 July 2020 and 3.9 million through 31 January 2021 (which roughly coincides with the first full year of the pandemic). The aim of this study is to update YLL estimates through the first 2 years of the pandemic.

Methods: We employed data regarding COVID-19 deaths through 5 February 2022 by jurisdiction, gender and age group. We used actuarial life expectancy tables by gender and age to estimate YLLs.

Results: We estimated roughly 9.7 million YLLs due to COVID-19 deaths. The number of YLLs per 10 000 capita was 297.5, with the highest rate in Mississippi (482.7) and the lowest in Vermont (61.4). There was substantial interstate variation in the timing of YLLs and differences in YLLs by gender. YLLs per death increased from 9.2 in the first year of the pandemic to 10.8 through the first 2 years.

Conclusions: Our findings improve our understanding of how the mortality effects of COVID-19 have evolved. This insight can be valuable to public health officials as the disease moves to an endemic phase.