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COVID-19 as the Leading Cause of Death in the United States

Educational Objective
To identify the key insights or developments described in this article
1 Credit CME

The current exponential increase in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is reaching a calamitous scale in the United States, potentially overwhelming the health care system and causing substantial loss of life. The news media dutifully report each day’s increase in new cases and deaths, but putting these numbers in perspective may be difficult. The daily US mortality rate for COVID-19 deaths is equivalent to the September 11, 2001, attacks, which claimed 2988 lives,1 occurring every 1.5 days, or 15 Airbus 320 jetliners,2 each carrying 150 passengers, crashing every day.

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Article Information

Published Online: December 17, 2020. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.24865

Correction: This article was corrected online December 28, 2020, to change the percentage of excess deaths to 50% and on March 28, 2022, to correct the diagnostic code for malignant neoplasms in the Table footnote.

Corresponding Author: Steven H. Woolf, MD, MPH, Center on Society and Health, Department of Family Medicine and Population Health, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, 830 E Main St, Ste 5035, Richmond, VA 23298 (steven.woolf@vcuhealth.org).

Conflict of Interest Disclosures: None reported.

Funding/Support: Drs Woolf and Chapman received partial funding from grant UL1TR002649 from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences.

Role of the Funder/Sponsor: The National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences had no role in preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript; and decision to submit the manuscript for publication.

References
1.
Anderson  RN , Miniño  AM , Fingerhut  LA , Warner  M , Heinen  MA .  Deaths: injuries, 2001.   Natl Vital Stat Rep. 2004;52(21):1-86.Google Scholar
2.
Airbus 320 seat map. United Airlines. Accessed November 27, 2020. https://www.united.com/ual/en/us/fly/travel/inflight/aircraft/airbus-320.html
3.
10 leading causes of death by age group, United States—2016. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Accessed December 8, 2020. https://www.cdc.gov/injury/wisqars/pdf/leading_causes_of_death_by_age_group_2016-508.pdf
4.
About underlying cause of death, 1999-2018. CDC WONDER online database. Accessed November 20, 2020. https://wonder.cdc.gov/ucd-icd10.html
5.
Provisional COVID-19 death counts by sex, age, and week. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Updated December 9, 2020. Accessed December 9, 2020. https://data.cdc.gov/NCHS/Provisional-COVID-19-Death-Counts-by-Sex-Age-and-W/vsak-wrfu
6.
CDC COVID data tracker: trends in number of COVID-19 cases and deaths in the US reported to CDC, by state/territory. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Accessed December 13, 2020. https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#trends_dailytrendscases
7.
Woolf  SH , Chapman  DA , Sabo  RT , Weinberger  DM , Hill  L , Taylor  DDH .  Excess deaths from COVID-19 and other causes, March-July 2020.   JAMA. 2020;324(15):1562-1564. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.19545 PubMedGoogle ScholarCrossref
AMA CME Accreditation Information

Credit Designation Statement: The American Medical Association designates this Journal-based CME activity activity for a maximum of 1.00  AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

Successful completion of this CME activity, which includes participation in the evaluation component, enables the participant to earn up to:

  • 1.00 Medical Knowledge MOC points in the American Board of Internal Medicine's (ABIM) Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program;;
  • 1.00 Self-Assessment points in the American Board of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery’s (ABOHNS) Continuing Certification program;
  • 1.00 MOC points in the American Board of Pediatrics’ (ABP) Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program;
  • 1.00 Lifelong Learning points in the American Board of Pathology’s (ABPath) Continuing Certification program; and
  • 1.00 CME points in the American Board of Surgery’s (ABS) Continuing Certification program

It is the CME activity provider's responsibility to submit participant completion information to ACCME for the purpose of granting MOC credit.

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