In a new study, researchers found that COVID-19 pandemic could cause a short-term decline in life expectancy in many regions of the world.
They found unless the spread of the disease is contained, COVID-19 will likely lead to reduced life expectancy in severely affected areas.
The study provides the first assessment of the potential impact of COVID-19 on period life expectancies.
The research was conducted by a team at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis.
Period life expectancy is a measure of the number of years that an average person may expect to live.
Improved healthcare, socioeconomic conditions, and education are among the key factors influencing our health and how long we live.
Life expectancy has been used as a measure of human development across countries and regions. Indeed, over the past century, life expectancy has increased significantly in many regions of the world.
In the new study, the team examined the impact of COVID-19-related deaths on life expectancy for four broad world regions across multiple rates of infection and age groups.
They found that at very low prevalence rates, the COVID-19 pandemic would not affect life expectancy, but at prevalence rates of only 2%, it could cause a drop in life expectancy in countries where average life expectancy is high—roughly around 80 years.
At higher prevalence rates, the impact on life expectancy would be greater, especially in Europe and North America.
At 10% prevalence, the loss in life expectancy is likely to be above one year in high life-expectancy countries such as those in Europe and North America.
At 50%, it would translate into three to nine years of life lost in high life-expectancy regions. In less developed regions, the impact is smaller given that there is already lower survival at older ages.
However, even in the most affected regions, the life expectancy will likely recover once the pandemic is over.
The team says it took Europe almost 20 years for average life expectancy at birth to increase by six years—from 72.8 years in 1990 to 78.6 years in 2019. COVID-19 could thus set back this indicator in 2020 to the values observed some time ago.
However, researchers do not know what is going to happen further. In many countries fatality from COVID is strongly decreasing, probably because the protocol of COVID treatment became better defined.
This type of analysis is useful to decision-makers as it shows in broad strokes the potential cost of human lives lost due to the disease.
One author of the study is IIASA researcher Guillaume Marois.
The study is published in PLOS ONE.
Copyright © 2020 Knowridge Science Report. All rights reserved.
