Life expectancy in US plummets by one year amid pandemic

New York: The United States saw the largest one-year drop in life expectancy since World War II during the COVID-19 pandemic, and Hispanic and Black population saw the largest declines, according to official data released on Wednesday.

Life expectancy at birth declined by 1.5 years in 2020 to 77.3 -- the lowest level since 2003, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) National Center for Health Statistics found.

"The numbers are devastating," USA Today quoted Chantel Martin, an assistant professor of epidemiology at the Gillings School of Global Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as saying.

Life expectancy declined by 3 years for the Hispanic population, to 78.8 years; 2.9 years for the non-Hispanic Black population, to 71.8 years; and 1.2 years for the non-Hispanic white population, to 77.6 years, according to the data.

Hispanic men, in particular, saw the greatest drop, 3.7 years, according to the data.