U.S. COVID Death Rate Highest Among Rich Nations
With less of its population vaccinated than peer nations, U.S. suffers higher mortality.
With the number of U.S. COVID-19 deaths climbing toward 1 million, the United States now has the highest death rate among the world’s wealthiest nations, most of which have also vaccinated far more of their populations.
“Any time we have deaths after the development of a vaccine—which largely takes off the table the possibility of death—is a tragedy,” said Jennifer Nuzzo, epidemiology lead for the Coronavirus Resource Center, in the Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Experts Insights newsletter.
The United States recently recorded 276 deaths per 100,000 people and had only vaccinated close to 66% of its population as of Feb. 10.
By comparison: The United Kingdom recently reported a vaccination rate of about three-quarters of the population and a death rate of 238 per 100,000 people. For Ireland, with 79% fully vaccinated, mortality stood at 126 deaths per 100,000. Canada had fully vaccinated about 81% of its population on Feb. 9 and reported 93 deaths per 100,000. Meanwhile, Australia, which has a similar vaccination rate as Canada, displayed a mortality rate of 17 deaths per 100,000.
In an interview on CNBC, Nuzzo warned that deaths would continue to rise in the coming weeks because states with lower vaccination rates are experiencing the Omicron variant later than other parts of the country.
Still, deaths reported a year ago during the Delta variant wave were higher amid far fewer cases than Omicron has caused. For example, for the week ending Feb. 4, 2022, there were 17,088 reported COVID deaths. At the same time in 2021, the past-week fatalities were 21,600 despite significantly fewer cases, according to an analysis by Emily Pond, a research data analyst for the Center for Health Security and the Coronavirus Resource Center.
Said Nuzzo, on CNBC: “Part of why Omicron looks more mild is because it is finding societies that have already amassed a fair amount of immunity from prior infection or vaccination.”
Johns Hopkins epidemiologist David Dowdy agreed with Nuzzo, according to the Expert Insights newsletter. Dowdy said most of the population has been exposed either to a vaccine or the virus multiple times by now.