Life expectancy in Colorado fell sharply during the pandemic, especially for People of Color

So many Coloradans have died from COVID-19 and related causes, including drug overdoses, that life expectancy statistics have declined dramatically over the past year.

The decline was most alarming among color communities, where enough Hispanic and black residents died in the pandemic that dropped both groups’ life expectancy statistics by about four years. The decline among Colorado whites was 1.4 years.

The state health department released the data Thursday afternoon showing that overall life expectancy in Colorado fell by a full two years, from 80.9 years in 2019 to 78.9 years in 2020.

Life expectancy is a statistical average of all people in a given geographic area or demographic group. It is not a predictor for individuals. The life expectancy of people who survived the pandemic has not changed.

But the state data echoes a new national study that shows that American life expectancy has fallen, falling 8.5 times the average for 16 high-income countries between 2018 and 2020. This study was by researchers from CU Boulder, Virginia Commonwealth University, and the Urban Institute and published in the BMJ, the journal of the British Medical Association.

“This is critical because we are losing years of the lives of certain vulnerable populations. That should never happen in our country, ”said Dr. Ozzie Grenardo, Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer at Centura Health.

Speculation surrounding the national study suggested that COVID-19 exposed and exacerbated the long-standing disparities between access to health care for white Americans and access for people of color. Additionally, more black and Hispanic residents of the United States worked on the front lines during the pandemic, exposing them to the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

“I thought it was incredibly sad,” said Dr. Tamaan Osbourne-Roberts, a family doctor serving a diverse population at an Iora primary care clinic in Denver.

He noted that the latest research underscores what he has learned and observed in his clinic, where many patients have skipped or delayed required treatment.

“We are certainly seeing the same chronic care difficulties that emerged before the pandemic worsened the pandemic.”

People of Color have been more severely affected by the coronavirus since the beginning of the pandemic.

Colorado is now nearing 7,000 deaths from COVID-19. In the early days of the pandemic, these deaths were disproportionately high among black and Hispanic residents.

Over time, official statistics have brought the percentage of deaths in both categories closer to the actual representation in the population. But nearly five percent of deaths are still listed as “unknown” ethnicity.

“I’m not surprised. I’m not surprised at all,” said Dr. Lilia Cervantes, associate professor in the medical division of Denver Health.

She noted that since the pandemic began, the US has seen “a disproportionate burden of COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths in our Latino and black communities. The same problems the rest of the nation had are particularly prevalent in Colorado. “

John Daley, CPRDr. Lilia Cervantes is an associate professor in the medical division of Denver Health. She said the U.S. has hit severe Latino and black communities in terms of COVID-19 cases, hospital admissions and deaths nationally and in Colorado since the pandemic began.

Deidre Johnson, CEO and executive director of the Center for African-American Health in Denver, said the conditions of the pandemic created the perfect opportunity for the virus to capitalize on the health inequalities people have been talking about for years.

“This is heartbreaking, but not surprising,” said Johnson. During the pandemic, it was easy to postpone regular checkups, dental work, and hospital visits as everyone tried to stay as safe as possible. Some providers and media even recommended postponing support, she said.

“It also became more difficult to get access to health care when you were in need,” said Johnson. “COVID-19 was a perfect storm of health inequalities in a strained health system.”

The data released by the state shows that life expectancy in Colorado has remained constant for the past decade and then declined sharply for all groups in 2020. For Hispanic residents, life expectancy decreased from 81.4 years to 77.3 years.

The life expectancy of the Black Coloradans fell by almost the same time from 78 years to 74.1 years.

The life expectancy of the Asia-Pacific islanders decreased from 88.8 years to 83.8 years and that of the American Indian / Alaskan natives from 83.4 to 80.5 years.

In the case of white Coloradans, the decrease was from 81.5 years to 80.1 years.

“Certainly, COVID played the most important role, as well as likely an increase in causes such as an overdose of medication,” said Kirk Bol, the manager of the state vital statistics program. He found that for Asian / Pacific Islanders and Native American / Alaskan Indians, with their relatively smaller populations and few overall deaths, “life expectancy estimates are becoming less reliable.”

CU researcher Ryan Masters, a co-author of the BJM study, said a lack of equitable access to health care and other inequalities were key factors.

“It’s devastating or horrific – an absolute tragedy. One that we probably could only have seen because of the deeply ingrained systemic factors, ”he said.

Systemic inequalities – from access to health insurance to where a person lives and works – have contributed to exacerbating inequalities.

A measure of these underlying disparities is the uninsured rate. In Colorado, 15.6 percent of Hispanic residents and 8.6 percent of black residents were uninsured in 2019, compared with 6.8 percent of white Coloradans. This is based on data from the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Cervantes highlighted the greater risk of people of color for COVID-19, which she described as “structural inequalities that increase exposure to the coronavirus”.

Many are employed as key workers and live in multigenerational homes, often unable to escape close contact with others, a significant danger given the spread of the virus through aerosol transmission. And they face higher unemployment rates and less reliable access to quality health care, food and exercise.

Additionally, she said, marginalized groups who also have a “prevalence of cardiometabolic diseases that increase the risk of poorer outcomes” of COVID-19, such as obesity, diabetes and high blood pressure.

“How long you live depends on where you live in this country, your zip code and is a measure of how healthy we are as a nation,” said Cervantes.

She highlighted “social determinants of health” as key factors in life expectancy. These are the “circumstances in the environment in which people are born, live, learn, work, worship and age that affect a wide range of health and quality of life outcomes, such as life expectancy or lifespan”.

She said research showed that these things account for about a 70 percent impact on our lifetimes when compared to social circumstances, environmental pollution, health care and behavioral patterns.

Cervantes grew up in Denver in the predominantly Latino Valverde and Westwood neighborhoods, near I-25 with few parks and grocery stores. Quoting pre-pandemic data, she said, “It is morally troubling to think about how there is a 6-year difference in life expectancy” between Valverde (78 years old) and the predominantly white Washington Park neighborhood (84 years old) even though they are less than 5 years old miles apart. ”

Cervantes believes these loopholes only worsened during the pandemic. “We need to invest more in social services as a nation,” she said.

The new dates are just the latest in a gritty parade of misery caused by the pandemic and the underlying injustices that have made it so devastating, especially in vulnerable communities.

Where the additional deaths came from and what needs to happen next to fix the differences in life expectancy.

In addition to deaths from COVID-19, Colorado recorded hundreds of additional deaths that appear to have at least one connection to the pandemic, as people treated themselves for anxiety and depression, or avoided infection out of concern for health care and other human interactions.

Causes such as drug overdoses, Alzheimer’s and liver diseases, hunger and parasitic diseases all rose by double digits in 2020. That’s more than the average number of deaths from causes in the three years before the pandemic began.

Health leaders and community officials say that now that this new data is out, it is up to Coloradoans and Americans to address the stark differences that make millions of Americans shorter lives compared to their counterparts in other affluent counties.

“We are all connected. It’s all linked, ”said Osbourne-Roberts. “The health of a population in our country affects the health of all populations in our country. And in that case, I hope people see this and really start looking at all of the health drivers of all Americans. “

The business’s first job is to improve vaccination rates in colored communities, said Grenardo, a member of the state’s vaccines task force.

To date, vaccination rates for COVID-19 in these communities in Colorado and the United States are below those of white populations.

“It really is another call to action for us to do something and make sure we vaccinate our populations that are most at risk of having problems with infection,” Grenardo said. “If we don’t do anything about it, these numbers are sure to get worse.”