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The average life expectancy in the United States plunged by a full year during the first six months of 2020, reflecting the devastating impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on the nation's overall health. In Black and Hispanic communities, the decline was more drastic, falling by nearly two years or more.
Life expectancy measures the average number of years a baby born today can expect to live. According to new research from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), the average person born in the United States now could expect to live to 77.8 years, based on data from January through June of last year. That number is a drop of one full year from the life expectancy of 78.8 years in 2019.
For communities of color — which suffered a disproportionately high number of deaths during the first part of the pandemic — the drops in life expectancy were even more dramatic. The average life expectancy for a non-Hispanic Black person dropped by 2.7 years, from 74.7 years to just 72. For Hispanics, life expectancy dropped by 1.9 years, from 81.8 years to 79.9. The gap in life expectancies between Black and white Americans is now the widest it has been since 1998, with whites living an estimated six years longer, to age 78.
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