Files and links (1)
Published, Version of Record (VoR)Open Access (License Unspecified), Open
Journal article
Excess Mortality During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Guatemala
American journal of public health (1971), v 111(10), pp 1839-1846
01 Oct 2021
PMID: 34554821
Featured in Collection : UN Sustainable Development Goals @ Drexel
Abstract
Objectives. To describe excess mortality during the COVID-19 pandemic in Guatemala during 2020 by week, age, sex, and place of death.
Methods. We used mortality data from 2015 to 2020, gathered through the vital registration system of Guatemala. We calculated weekly mortality rates, overall and stratified by age, sex, and place of death. We fitted a generalized additive model to calculate excess deaths, adjusting for seasonality and secular trends and compared excess deaths to the official COVID-19 mortality count.
Results. We found an initial decline of 26% in mortality rates during the first weeks of the pandemic in 2020, compared with 2015 to 2019. These declines were sustained through October 2020 for the population younger than 20 years and for deaths in public spaces and returned to normal from July onward in the population aged 20 to 39 years. We found a peak of 73% excess mortality in mid-July, especially in the population aged 40 years or older. We estimated a total of 8036 excess deaths (95% confidence interval57935, 8137) in 2020, 46% higher than the official COVID-19 mortality count.
Conclusions. The extent of this health crisis is underestimated when COVID-19 confirmed death counts are used.
Metrics
Details
- Title
- Excess Mortality During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Guatemala
- Creators
- Kevin Martinez-Folgar - Columbia UniversityDiego Alburez-Gutierrez - Columbia UniversityAlejandra Paniagua-Avila - Columbia UniversityManuel Ramirez-Zea - Columbia UniversityUsama Bilal - Columbia University
- Publication Details
- American journal of public health (1971), v 111(10), pp 1839-1846
- Publisher
- Amer Public Health Assoc Inc
- Number of pages
- 8
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Urban Health Collaborative; Epidemiology and Biostatistics
- Web of Science ID
- WOS:000753612500035
- Scopus ID
- 2-s2.0-85118286096
- Other Identifier
- 991019167694504721
UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
This publication has contributed to the advancement of the following goals:
InCites Highlights
Data related to this publication, from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool:
- Collaboration types
- Domestic collaboration
- International collaboration
- Web of Science research areas
- Public, Environmental & Occupational Health