The COVID-19 pandemic has an immediate impact on the death rate of the population. At the same time, however, it also has enormous economic effects. First, many people avoid social contact in order to avoid becoming infected. Therefore, they no longer go to the restaurant, do not do a wellness weekend and go to the hairdresser less often. This reduces consumer spending, especially for services and entertainment.
Second, governments in many countries are imposing strict curfews and extensive business closings to reduce the risk of contagion. These measures reduce social contacts and help save human lives and avoid overloading the health system. At the same time, however, they also lead to a decline in economic activity.
The decline in economic output caused by the pandemic itself and the lockdown measures also has a long-term impact on life expectancy and the death rate of the population. Francesco Bianchi from the Department of Economics at Duke University, Giada Bianchi from Harvard Medical School and Dongho Song from Carey Business School at Johns Hopkins University have analyzed this connection and published their research results in a working paper.
The researchers proceeded as follows. First, they determined the historical relationship between unemployment on the one hand and life expectancy and death rate on the other. Amazingly, it turned out that an increase in unemployment reduced the death rate in the short term. However, this is easy to explain: the unemployed stay at home more often than the employed and are therefore not exposed to the dangers at work and on the way there. In the long term, however, a sharp rise in the unemployment rate as a result of a recession has a negative impact on life expectancy and death rate.
With the help of this finding, the researchers calculate the long-term effects of the pandemic and lockdown-related increase in the unemployment rate on life expectancy and death rate. The results are terrifying. In the US, the COVID-19 recession leads to a cumulative reduction in life expectancy of 0.33 years in 5 years. The corresponding values for 10, 15 and 20 years are 0.63, 0.65 and 0.66 years, respectively.
The age-adjusted death rate increases by 13.39 deaths per 100,000 population in 5 years. The corresponding values for 10, 15 and 20 years are 18.73, 17.77 and 17.71 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants.
In absolute terms, this means that as a result of the recession caused by the pandemic and the associated lockdown measures, 130,000 people who would have survived the COVID-19 recession are expected to die in the USA within the next 5 years . In the next 10 years there will be 470,000, in the next 15 years 840,000 and in the next 20 years a total of 1.22 million additional deaths.
These results make it clear how important it is to consider not only the virological effects but also the economic consequences when assessing protective measures to combat pandemics. As the research results show, epidemiological protective measures, if they lead to a recession, lead to a significant decrease in life expectancy and a marked increase in the age-related death rate as a result of the rise in unemployment.
–
