About 525,000 more deaths occurred among US adults in 2023 than would be expected if mortality tendencies continued before 2010. More than 90 percent of these deaths occurred between people without a university degree and were largely caused by cardiovascular disease, Health of people.
Cardiovascular diseases, such as cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes, have emerged as some of the key mortality rates in the United States in the last 15 years. People with limited education feel the burden of this crisis, according to a new study by the School of Public Health at the University of Boston (Busph), the University of Helsinki and the University of Minnesota.
For men and women without a degree in University (BA), mortality between 2011-2023 was remarkably higher than expected if it continued mortality rates from 2006-2010. Among 564,855 excessive deaths in 2023 only, 481,211 occurred among people without increasing mortality 26 % BA-A 26 % between this population, compared to trends before 2010. On the contrary, mortality increased by only eight percent among people receiving BA. The study was published in Jama Health Forum.
While attention focused on how Covid-19 pandemics led to a reduction in life expectancy and excessive mortality, our study shows that the United States is already facing a growing number of excessive deaths before the pandemic. The pandemic further exacerbates these trends, with excessive deaths peak in 2021.
Dr. Eugenio Paglino, Study Head writer, Postdoctoral researcher at Helsinki’s Demography and Population Institute at the University of Helsinki
The findings emphasize the urgent need to tackle cardiovascular hypothesis and chronic diseases at national level, especially social and structural factors that could explain why people with less education are disproportionate to these negative health effects.
“The United States is facing a crisis of deterioration of mortality that is largely falling on those shoulders with less education,” says Senior and the corresponding author Dr. Andrew Stokes, Associate Professor of Global Health in Busph. “Life in rural areas, lack of access to healthy foods and good nutrition, working in precarious sectors-these are the things that find it difficult to eat well, sleep well and exercise.
For the study, Dr. Stokes and his associates from the University of Helsinki and the University of Minnesota used national mortality and education data to examine 47, 545, 611 deaths between US adults aged 35 and over 2006-2023, 2011-2023.
While less severe, circulatory diseases were also the leading cause of excessive deaths between adults with BA or equivalent degree.
“Despite the decades of progress in prevention and treatment, cardiovascular disease (including heart disease and stroke) remain the main causes of death and major disability in American and worldwide,” says Dr. Donald Lloyd-Jones, Director of the Framingham Center of the University of Boston for population science and the primary researcher of the Framingham heart. Dr. Lloyd-Jones, who is also Professor of Alexander Graham Bell and the head of preventive medicine and epidemiology at the Bu Chobanian & Avedisian Medical School, did not participate in the study. “We know that social health factors, including socio -economic status, neighborhood environment and, in particular, education, have a significant impact on predisposing risk factors on cardiovascular disease, such as negative nutrition, obesity, diabetes, blood pressure and blood pressure.
Diabetes was also a leading 2023 that contribute to excessive deaths between men and women without NW, and to a lesser extent, those with NW. Researchers report a series of factors that have led to an increase in unhealthy food consumption, from effective marketing and advertising over-processed foods to lack access to affordable, nutritious dense foods.
It is worth noting that the findings also showed that over -doses of drugs contributed significantly to excessive deaths among men with less education, but were much less intense among men with more training.
“This observation reflects the downstream consequences of using prescription drugs, which led to a broad dependence on drugs and overdose in the early 2000s, before translating heroin, fentanyl and other products that were more easily available during this period.” “The fact that drug poisoning were still a major cause of excessive deaths for men without BA in 2023 points in the continued role of the deaths of despair in American mortality.”
“This project is a clear causes to understand the threats of the health that Americans face with less education,” says Dr. Maria Glymour, president and professor of Epidemiology in Busph, who has not participated in the study, but has studied how education is predicting health. “The mortality differences mentioned here indicate that we must consider the ’causes of the causes’ of social inequalities.
Researchers have noticed some promising tendencies in mortality. Among women with BA, cancer deaths and other external causes (such as accidents and violence) were reduced in 2023, compared to sets between 2006-2010.
“If we had just maintained the progress we made for each of these educational groups 20 years ago, there are half a million Americans who died in 2023 that would not die,” says studying Dr. Elizabeth Wrigley-Field, Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Minnesota, twin cities. “Almost 92 percent of them did not have a college degree. The fact that the causes of these deaths cover such different causes, including cardiovascular disease, overdose of drugs and diabetes, tells us that there is really a deep gap in who benefits from it.”
One of the most important ways in which education matters is the type of work that gives people access, he adds. “We hope that these results will contribute to a debate on ways in which American workplaces do not always favor good health and what would allow American workers to live a longer life.”
Source:
Magazine report:
Paglino, E., et al. (2025). Divergent tendencies of mortality from educational achievement in the US. Jama Health Forum. doi.org/10.1001/jamahealthfor.2025.1647.