Life expectancy declines in Russia during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020

Abstract

Period life expectancy witnessed declines in 2020 at a scale that is unprecedented in recent history. With the recent availability of data from Russia,2 we show that Russia is no exception. Data from death registrations indicate that life expectancy between 2019 and 2020 in Russia fell by -1.68 (95% Confidence interval (CI): -1.72,-1.63) years among males (from 68.4 to 66.7 years) and -1.80 (95% CI: -1.85,-1.76) years for females (from 78.4 to 76.6 years). Comparisons of these losses to those among the 29 countries we previously reported, reveal that life expectancy losses among females were the largest in Russia, while losses among males stand only behind the USA (2.2 years) and Lithuania (1.7 years).