학술논문

Excess Mortality in California by Education During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Document Type
article
Source
American Journal of Preventive Medicine. 63(5)
Subject
Public Health
Health Sciences
Emerging Infectious Diseases
Coronaviruses
Health Disparities
Social Determinants of Health
Minority Health
Infectious Diseases
Coronaviruses Disparities and At-Risk Populations
Good Health and Well Being
Reduced Inequalities
Quality Education
Humans
Pandemics
COVID-19
Educational Status
Ethnicity
California
Medical and Health Sciences
Education
Biomedical and clinical sciences
Health sciences
Language
Abstract
IntroductionUnderstanding educational patterns in excess mortality during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic may help to identify strategies to reduce disparities. It is unclear whether educational inequalities in COVID-19 mortality have persisted throughout the pandemic, spanned the full range of educational attainment, or varied by other demographic indicators of COVID-19 risks, such as age or occupation.MethodsThis study analyzed individual-level California Department of Public Health data on deaths occurring between January 2016 and February 2021 among individuals aged ≥25 years (1,502,202 deaths). Authors applied ARIMA (autoregressive integrated moving average) models to subgroups defined by the highest level of education and other demographics (age, sex, race/ethnicity, U.S. nativity, occupational sector, and urbanicity). Authors estimated excess deaths (the number of observed deaths minus the number of deaths expected to occur under the counterfactual of no pandemic) and excess deaths per 100,000 individuals.ResultsEducational inequalities in excess mortality emerged early in the pandemic and persisted throughout the first year. The greatest per-capita excess occurred among people without high-school diplomas (533 excess deaths/100,000), followed by those with a high-school diploma but no college (466/100,000), some college (156/100,000), and bachelor's degrees (120/100,000), and smallest among people with graduate/professional degrees (101/100,000). Educational inequalities occurred within every subgroup examined. For example, per-capita excess mortality among Latinos with no college experience was 3.7 times higher than among Latinos with at least some college experience.ConclusionsPervasive educational inequalities in excess mortality during the pandemic suggest multiple potential intervention points to reduce disparities.