Ellicott C. Matthay is with the Center for Health and Community, School of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco. Kate A. Duchowny and Alicia R. Riley are with the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco. Sandro Galea is with the Boston University School of Public Health, Boston, MA.
Am J Public Health. 2021 Apr;111(4):696-699. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2020.306095. Epub 2021 Feb 18.
To project the range of excess deaths potentially associated with COVID-19-related unemployment in the United States and quantify inequities in these estimates by age, race/ethnicity, gender, and education. We used previously published meta-analyzed hazard ratios (HRs) for the unemployment-mortality association, unemployment data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and mortality data from the National Center for Health Statistics to estimate 1-year age-standardized deaths attributable to COVID-19-related unemployment for US workers aged 25 to 64 years. To accommodate uncertainty, we tested ranges of unemployment and HR scenarios. Our best estimate is that there will be 30 231 excess deaths attributable to COVID-19-related unemployment between April 2020 and March 2021. Across scenarios, attributable deaths ranged from 8315 to 201 968. Attributable deaths were disproportionately high among Blacks, men, and those with low education. Deaths attributable to COVID-19-related unemployment will add to those directly associated with the virus and will disproportionately burden groups already experiencing incommensurate COVID-19 mortality. Supportive economic policies and interventions addressing long-standing harmful social structures are essential to mitigate the unequal health harms of COVID-19.
预测与 COVID-19 相关失业相关的超额死亡人数在美国，并按年龄、种族/族裔、性别和教育程度量化这些估计的不平等。我们使用了先前发表的失业与死亡率关联的荟萃分析风险比 (HR)、劳工统计局的失业数据以及国家卫生统计中心的死亡率数据，来估计 25 至 64 岁美国工人因 COVID-19 相关失业而导致的 1 年标准化超额死亡人数。为了适应不确定性，我们测试了失业和 HR 情景的范围。我们的最佳估计是，在 2020 年 4 月至 2021 年 3 月期间，与 COVID-19 相关的失业将导致 30231 人死亡。在各种情况下，归因于死亡的人数范围从 8315 到 201968 不等。归因于死亡的人数在黑人、男性和受教育程度较低的人群中不成比例地高。与 COVID-19 相关的失业导致的死亡人数将与直接与病毒相关的死亡人数相加，并不成比例地给已经经历不成比例 COVID-19 死亡率的人群带来负担。支持性的经济政策和干预措施，解决长期存在的有害社会结构，对于减轻 COVID-19 带来的不平等健康危害至关重要。
