scholarly journals Social determinants of mortality from COVID-19: A simulation study using NHANES

PLoS Medicine ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. e1003490 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin Seligman ◽  
Maddalena Ferranna ◽  
David E. Bloom

Background The COVID-19 epidemic in the United States is widespread, with more than 200,000 deaths reported as of September 23, 2020. While ecological studies show higher burdens of COVID-19 mortality in areas with higher rates of poverty, little is known about social determinants of COVID-19 mortality at the individual level. Methods and findings We estimated the proportions of COVID-19 deaths by age, sex, race/ethnicity, and comorbid conditions using their reported univariate proportions among COVID-19 deaths and correlations among these variables in the general population from the 2017–2018 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). We used these proportions to randomly sample individuals from NHANES. We analyzed the distributions of COVID-19 deaths by race/ethnicity, income, education level, and veteran status. We analyzed the association of these characteristics with mortality by logistic regression. Summary demographics of deaths include mean age 71.6 years, 45.9% female, and 45.1% non-Hispanic white. We found that disproportionate deaths occurred among individuals with nonwhite race/ethnicity (54.8% of deaths, 95% CI 49.0%–59.6%, p < 0.001), individuals with income below the median (67.5%, 95% CI 63.4%–71.5%, p < 0.001), individuals with less than a high school level of education (25.6%, 95% CI 23.4% –27.9%, p < 0.001), and veterans (19.5%, 95% CI 15.8%–23.4%, p < 0.001). Except for veteran status, these characteristics are significantly associated with COVID-19 mortality in multiple logistic regression. Limitations include the lack of institutionalized people in the sample (e.g., nursing home residents and incarcerated persons), the need to use comorbidity data collected from outside the US, and the assumption of the same correlations among variables for the noninstitutionalized population and COVID-19 decedents. Conclusions Substantial inequalities in COVID-19 mortality are likely, with disproportionate burdens falling on those who are of racial/ethnic minorities, are poor, have less education, and are veterans. Healthcare systems must ensure adequate access to these groups. Public health measures should specifically reach these groups, and data on social determinants should be systematically collected from people with COVID-19.

2007 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 350-366 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy I. Cass

The efficacy of routine activities theory is examined to explain sexual assault on the college campus. Although many research studies have utilized routine activities theory to predict sexual assault using individual-level factors, little is known about the effect of school-level factors on a student’s risk of sexual assault. Based on interviews from 3,036 randomly selected students and surveys from 11 randomly selected colleges in the United States, a hierarchical linear model was created to predict student victimizations by school characteristics. For the individual, results reveal that being female, drug use, and marital status are statistically significant for predicting the probability of a sexual assault. At the institutional level, however, none of the variables are significant in predicting sexual assault among college coeds. Policy implications for prevention measures on college campuses are discussed.


Author(s):  
David C. Colston ◽  
Bethany J. Simard ◽  
Yanmei Xie ◽  
Marshall Chandler McLeod ◽  
Michael R. Elliott ◽  
...  

Little research examines how tobacco quitlines affect disparities in smoking cessation in the United States. Our study utilized data from the Tobacco Use Supplement to the Current Population Survey (2010, 2011, 2012, 2015, 2018) (TUS-CPS) and state-level quitline data from the North American Quitline Consortium and National Quitline Data Warehouse. We ran multilevel logistic regression models assessing a state-run quitline’s budget, reach, number of counseling sessions offered per caller, and hours of operation on 90-day smoking cessation. Multiplicative interactions between all exposures and sex, race/ethnicity, income, and education were tested to understand potential effect modification. We found no evidence that budget, reach, number of counseling sessions, or hours available for counseling were associated with cessation in the main effects analyses. However, when looking at effect modification by sex, we found that higher budgets were associated with greater cessation in males relative to females. Further, higher budgets and offering more sessions had a stronger association with cessation among individuals with lower education, while available counseling hours were more strongly associated with cessation among those with higher education. No quitline characteristics examined were associated with smoking cessation. We found evidence for effect modification by sex and education. Despite proven efficacy at the individual-level, current resource allocation to quitlines may not be sufficient to improve rates of cessation.


2021 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 209-210
Author(s):  
Michael Leo Owens

Charge: As Ismail K. White and Chryl N. Laird note, collectively more than 80% of African Americans self-identify as Democrats according to surveys, and no Republican presidential candidate has won more than 13% of the Black vote since 1968. This is true despite the fact that at the individual level many African Americans are increasingly politically moderate and even conservative. Against this backdrop, what explains the enduring nature of African American support for the Democratic Party? In Steadfast Democrats: How Social Forces Shape Black Political Behavior, White and Laird answer this question by developing the concept of “racialized social constraint,” a unifying behavioral norm meant to empower African Americans as a group and developed through a shared history of struggle against oppression and for freedom and equality. White and Laird consider the historical development of this norm, how it is enforced, and its efficacy both in creating party loyalty and as a path to Black political power in the United States. On the cusp of perhaps the most consequential presidential election in American history, one for which African American turnout was crucial, we asked a range of leading political scientists to assess the relative strengths, weaknesses, and ramifications of this argument.


1961 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 134-140 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony Leeds

Few courses in anthropology have been taught as such at the high school level in the United States. Nevertheless, both in high schools and in elementary schools, and more particularly in the private schools, information which the anthropologists consider their own special interest has been used. Thus, children may be taught information about the Eskimo, apparently the favorite culture to represent the non-Western world and almost undoubtedly the only primitive one existing in the curriculum-makers' Baedeker, although an occasional bow in made to the American plains or Southwest. Now and then, studies of the major Asian countries are made whose focus is cultural rather than properly geographical. Other cultures, ranging up to the most complex, ordinarily appear to be brought into a curriculum more as functions of the description of the locations inhabited by humans than as descriptions, informed by some conception as to the nature of culture, of the specific cultures themselves. In short, one may safely assert, I believe, that the students get some sense of the variations exhibited by societies but mostly as curiosa and oddities of peculiar peoples. They do not get a sense of the cultural necessities of variation and differences as these derive from the technological articulations with environment. Rather, variation and differences are presented as if they were more or less accidentally associated with particular kinds of geographic features. Children appear rarely to be taught that there is such a class of events as technologies which can systematically be studied like geography or economics. Rather, they become familiar only with technical activities which they see as scattered hither and yon rather planlessly on the earth's far-away surfaces, activities such as camel-herding here, rice-paddy planting there. Certainly they get no sense of the effects of technology as a formal determinant of social structure and as conditioners of ideologies; far less are they presented, or do they achieve, a notion of culture as a total system. Much less are they led to see culture as a system which operates by its own laws, which has its own distinguishing characteristics and process, and whose variants cannot be reduced to any known ultimate value hierarchy. Thus, by learning mere esoterica, they are prevented from learning the fundamental first step required of all anthropologists, the scientific and ethical principle of cultural relativism. Consequently, too, they are prevented from learning the kind of perspective on world, culture, and self which anthropology can afford.


Author(s):  
Md. Razib Alam ◽  
Bonwoo Koo ◽  
Brian Paul Cozzarin

Abstract Our objective is to study Canada’s patenting activity over time in aggregate terms by destination country, by assignee and destination country, and by diversification by country of destination. We collect bibliographic patent data from the Canadian Intellectual Property Office and the United States Patent and Trademark Office. We identify 19,957 matched Canada–US patents, 34,032 Canada-only patents, and 43,656 US-only patents from 1980 to 2014. Telecommunications dominates in terms of International Patent Classification technologies for US-only and Canada–US patents. At the firm level, the greatest number of matched Canada–US patents were granted in the field of telecommunications, at the university level in pharmaceuticals, at the government level in control and instrumentation technology, and at the individual level in civil engineering. We use entropy to quantify technological diversification and find that diversification indices decline over time for Canada and the USA; however, all US indices decline at a faster rate.


2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 64-76
Author(s):  
Riski Emaniar

This research is motivated by the number of traffic violation cases carried out by the community in Bangka Belitung. Many traffic violations carried out by children. This study aims to determine the number of traffic violators based on the level of education of the people in the Bangka Belitung Islands Province in 2016, thus it can be seen the number of traffic violators at certain levels of education in the Bangka Belitung region. The method used in this research is descriptive quantitative. This descriptive research is used to describe an event or event and social phenomenon in factual and systematic. This method is used to explain the data contained in the table by using descriptive explanations. The data used is secondary data. The results showed that the highest violations in Pangkalpinang City compared to other districts. Based on the data obtained, the high school level in the city of Pangkalpinang becomes the highest number of traffic violators. Many factors cause violations among students, namely internal and external factors. Internal factors come from within the individual, while external factors are found in the surrounding environment. Need appropriate handling to overcome the occurrence of various traffic violations among students. The method taken can be preventive and repressive.   Keywords: BPS, students, minor violations.  


Author(s):  
Michael McDonald ◽  
◽  
Yulei Pang

This paper will discuss the correlation between the SAT and the Math Inventory Test. Many school districts adopted the Math Inventory as a tool to measure student growth from grades kindergarten through high school. The Math Inventory is a computer-administered test that gives students math problems spanning from counting to high school level math. When completed, the students are given a quantile measure, much like a Lexile score for reading skill. The purpose of this study is to figure out if success on the Math Inventory is a good indicator for performing well on the SAT. For most high schools around the United States, objectives and lessons are aligned with those of the SAT. The goal of high school teachers is for students to excel on the SAT so that they can go to college, which means the tests used in middle school should be aligned with that goal. If the Math Inventory is not, then it might not be a very good use of school time and resources. Data was analyzed from the 2017-2018 school year from ten different high schools in an urban school district to determine the correlation between Math Inventory score, and the math score/sub scores of SAT/PSAT. The value of the Pearson’s correlation coefficient is used to suggest a fairly moderate positive relationship between these two variables.


2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-100 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gopal K Singh ◽  
Isaac E. Kim, Jr. ◽  
Mehrete Girmay ◽  
Chrisp Perry ◽  
Gem P. Daus ◽  
...  

Objectives: Dramatic increases in opioid and drug overdose mortality have occurred in the United States (US) over the past two decades. To address this national public health crisis and identify gaps in the literature, we analyzed recent empirical trends in US drug overdose mortality by key social determinants and conducted a selective review of the recent literature on the magnitude of the opioid crisis facing different racial/ethnic, socioeconomic, and rural-urban segments of the US population. Methods: We used the 1999-2017 mortality data from the US National Vital Statistics System to analyze trends in drug overdose mortality by race/ethnicity, age, and geographic area. Log-linear regression was used to model mortality trends. Using various key words and their combinations, we searched PubMed and Google Scholar for select peerreviewed journal articles and government reports published on the opioid epidemic between 2010 and 2018. Results: Our original analysis and review indicate marked increases in drug overdose mortality overall and by race/ethnicity and geographic regions, with adolescents and young adults experiencing steep increases in mortality between 1999 and 2017. Our selective search yielded 405 articles, of which 39 publications were selected for detailed review. Suicide mortality from drug overdose among teens aged 12-19 increased consistently between 2009 and 2017, particularly among teen girls. The rise of efficient global supply chains has increased opioid prescription use and undoubtedly contributed to the opioid epidemic. Many other important contributing factors to the epidemic include lack of education and economic opportunities, poor working conditions, and low social capital in disadvantaged communities. Conclusions and Global Health Implications: Our analysis and review indicate substantial disparities in drug overdoses and related mortality, pain management, and treatment outcomes according to social determinants. Increases in drug overdoses and resultant mortality are not only unique to the US, but have also been observed in other industrialized countries. Healthcare systems, community leaders, and policymakers addressing the opioidepidemic should focus on upstream structural factors including education, economic opportunity, social cohesion, racial/ethnic disadvantage, geographic isolation, and life satisfaction. Key words: • Opioids • Drug overdose • Mortality • Pain management • Treatment • Race/Ethnicity • Social determinants • Health disparities Copyright © 2019 Singh et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.


2020 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 233372142091478
Author(s):  
Ami R. Moore ◽  
Maggie Bohm-Jordan ◽  
Foster Amey ◽  
Elias Mpofu

Background: Significant racial/ethnic disparities exist in the prevalence of functional disability among older Americans. Objective: The study analyzed the odds of older people in the United States experiencing single and multiple disabilities, by race and region of birth. Method: Data came from the American Community Survey (2011–2015). Multinomial logistic regression analysis was used. Results: Region of birth, race/ethnicity, age, citizenship status, duration of stay, sex, marital status, veteran status, educational attainment, poverty status, and class of workers were all significantly associated with reports of either single or multiple disabilities. However, the introduction of the interaction terms for citizenship status by race modified some of the significant results. For instance, being born in Latin America no longer reduced the odds in reports of both single and multiple disabilities. However, compared with Whites and native-born of all races, both Hispanics who were either naturalized or were noncitizens had lower odds of reporting multiple disabilities (27% and 28% lower, respectively), whereas naturalized Hispanics also had significantly reduced odds (22%) for a single disability. Conclusion: These findings add to the disability, race/ethnicity, and place of birth literature.


1987 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
JOHN R. HIBBING

This is an analysis of the effects of economic factors on voting behavior in the United Kingdom. Aggregate- and individual-level data are used. When the results are compared to findings generated by the United States case, some intriguing differences appear. To mention just two examples, unemployment and inflation seem to be much more important in the United Kingdom than in the United States, and changes in real per capita income are positively related to election results in the United States and negatively related in the United Kingdom. More generally, while the aggregate results are strong and the individual-level results weak in the United States, in the United Kingdom the situation is practically reversed.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document