Published in the journal JAMA Network Open, a new study found that disparities in US COVID death rates between Black and White adults narrowed substantially from the first to the second year of the pandemic, from 339 deaths to 45 deaths per 100,000 people in 2021, after accounting for age. But this sharp decline mostly resulted from an increase in COVID deaths among White people, as well as a geographical shift in mortality from large, urban cities to rural and smaller metropolitan areas, rather than from decreases in deaths among the Black population.
New research from the University of Minnesota shows that Black, Hispanic and Asian populations are significantly more likely to die of COVID-19, regardless of their vaccination status at the population level.