Society of Actuaries Shows Continued Young Adult Mortality Spike
"The White-Collar group continues to have the highest mortality.": Part 10
In the past few days, the Society of Actuaries issued its May 2023 report, which updates U.S. group life insurance mortality through December 2022.
Thrilling, we know.
It’s a depressing topic, but is essential to explore if we truly want to understand the Covid era and avoid similar mistakes.
In past reports, we showed that in 2020, the initial Covid year, Americans who were older and more unhealthy died in large numbers. Then, in 2021, young and middle-age healthy people began dying at unprecedentedly high rates.
By 2022, the milder Omicron variant dominated. One might have presumed, therefore, that mortality would have reverted to normal, or even below normal, to make up for the two prior terrible years. And yet the new SOA figures, which aggregate around 90% of all U.S. employer-based group term life policies, show that 2022 was another awful year – especially for young adults.
As you can see in the table above, 25-54 year olds continued to suffer at high rates. The data show 2022 mortality rates for working American young adults age 25-44 were 21-34% higher than normal for the entire year. For 45-54 year olds, the quarterly excess ranged from 7% to 28%. Not as bad as 2021, but far, far higher than expected when we should be enjoying mortality deficits to make up for 2020 and 2021.
The vast majority of excess mortality in 2022, as seen in the table below, is classified as non-Covid.
International data from high-income nations shows the same pattern in 2021 and 2022. We recently highlighted Japan and Germany.
Here is early 2023 data from England and Wales, showing continued excess mortality among 15-44 year old Brits.
Back in the U.S., the Society of Actuaries notes another surprising finding:
The Gray-Collar group had the lowest actual-to-expected ratios (A/E’s) relative to baseline over the pandemic period at around 10%, followed by the Blue-Collar group at 14%. The White-Collar group continues to have the highest mortality A/E relative to baseline at 19% during the pandemic period.
Why are public health authorities in the U.S. and around the world, who panicked over Covid, so silent and unconcerned when it comes to an unprecedented epidemic of non-Covid deaths in young cohorts, now extending into year number four?
Comments on State Capacity Covidology
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Double Down Hallucination: Part 2
Who Really Wanted to Speed Remedies?: Part 3
Defending Steph Curry: A Computer Model: Part 4
Where Did All the Workers Go?: Part 5
A Narrative That’s Too Big To Fail: Part 6
Mortality Play: 2020 vs. 2021-22: Part 7
Japan Matches Germany's 2022 Mortality Spike: Part 9
Society of Actuaries Shows Continued Young Adult Mortality Spike: Part 10
Dr. Hotez’s Data Is Highly Flawed: Part 11
Covid and the Golly Folly: The blind spot of gee whiz technology futurism: Part 12
This should be headline news around the world.
Is there a table from the SOA that includes data going back earlier than 2020? Say to 2018?