The Root, Published By Candace McDuffie
On Tuesday, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published a shocking new Yale study that sheds a light on racial disparities in the U.S. regarding life expectancy for Black folks. Studies have shown for years the Black people suffer from illness at higher rates and die younger than white people.
However, the study JAMA shared revealed that the higher mortality rate for Black Americans translates to 1.63 million excess deaths compared to white people. This is over the course of more than 20 years. The higher mortality rate for Black folks from 1999 to 2020 led to the loss of more than 80 million years of life in comparison to white folks.
America managed to make progress in attempting to close the gap between Black and white mortality rates from 1999 to 2011. According to the document, heart disease was the number one contributor towards age-adjusted excess mortality for men and women, followed by cancer for men. From 2011 to 2019, however, that progress hindered. In 2020, Covid-19 expunged two decades of advancement as the disease hit Black Americans the hardest. Read more
