Association of Medical Stimulants With Mortality in the US From 2010 to 2017
Joshua C. Black, Gabrielle E. Bau, Janetta Iwanicki, Richard C. Dart
Abstract
Discussion | During the COVID-19 pandemic in California, older adults, Black and Latino residents, and those without college degrees have experienced the highest per capita excess mortality. Following the statewide shelter-in-place, Latino residents and those without a high school degree/GED had the greatest increase in excess per capita mortality, with rates more than tripling after reopening. We hypothesize that this pattern reflects the risk of COVID-19 death faced by low-wage, essential workers and their social networks owing to occupational exposure, crowded housing, and inadequate access to testing or treatments. 6 Although a limitation of this study is that our analyses were not designed to determine the associations with particular policies, our results suggest that the policies adopted to date have had disparate outcomes across population subgroups. Our findings underscore the importance of examining the inequitable effects of policies during the pandemic,