Unequal impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on excess deaths, life expectancy, and premature mortality across Spanish regions in 2020 and 2021

  1. Nazrul Islam
  2. Fernando J. García López
  3. Dmitri A. Jdanov
  4. Miguel Ángel Royo- Bordonada
  5. Kamlesh Khunti
  6. Sarah Lewington
  7. Ben Lacey
  8. Martin White
  9. Eva JA Morris
  10. María Victoria Zunzunegui

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Abstract

Spain is one of the most heavily affected countries by the Covid-19 pandemic. In this study, we estimated the regional inequalities in excess deaths and premature mortality in Spain. Between January 2020 and June 2021, an estimated 89,200 (men: 48,000; women: 41,200) excess deaths occurred in the 17 Spanish regions with a substantial variability (highest in Madrid: 22,000, lowest in Canary Islands: -210). Highest reductions in life expectancy at birth ( e 0 ) in 2020 were observed in Madrid (men: -3.48 years, women: -2.15), Castile La Mancha (men: -2.67, women: -2.30), and Castile and León (men: -2.00, women: -1.32). In the first six months of 2021, the highest reduction in e 0 was observed in Valencian Community (men: -2.04, women: -1.63), Madrid (men: - 2.37), and Andalusia (men: -1.75; women: -1.43). In some Spanish regions, life expectancy at age 65 during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 was comparable to that observed as far back as 20 years ago.

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    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.11.29.21266617: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    NIH rigor criteria are not applicable to paper type.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We found bar graphs of continuous data. We recommend replacing bar graphs with more informative graphics, as many different datasets can lead to the same bar graph. The actual data may suggest different conclusions from the summary statistics. For more information, please see Weissgerber et al (2015).

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    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
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  2. Version published to 10.1101/2021.11.29.21266617v1 on medRxiv