MoMo Productions/Getty Images(NEW YORK) New data from the American Heart Association highlights the major impact COVID-19 had on cardiovascular health and death rates during the first year of the pandemic. At least 928,741 Americans died from cardiovascular disease-related causes in 2020, the annual statistical report revealed. That represents the largest one-year increase since 2015 and tops the previous high of 910,000 deaths recorded in 2003, according to the American Heart Association. "This is our first real evidence based on the impact of the early years of the pandemic," Dr. Connie Tsao, chair of the Statistical Update writing group and assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, said. It's something experts had predicted. "This was not surprising," Dr. Michelle Albert, volunteer president of the American Heart Association and chair in cardiology and professor of medicine at the University of California at San Francisco, told ABC News. C
Cardiovascular-related deaths increased dramatically in 2020, marking the largest single-year increase since 2015 and surpassing the previous record from 2003, according to the 2023 Statistical Update from the American Heart Association.
New data from the American Heart Association highlights the major impact COVID-19 had on cardiovascular health and death rates during the first year of the pandemic.