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Coronavirus: 1 in 500 Americans have died of COVID-19, data shows

Since the start of the pandemic, about 1 in 500 Americans have died of COVID-19, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau and John Hopkins University.

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In April 2020, there were 331.4 million people living in the U.S., according to the Census. As of Thursday afternoon, nearly 667,000 people had died nationwide of COVID-19, according to a tally from Johns Hopkins University.

The numbers show about .2% of the population – or 1 in 500 people – has died of COVID-19. The numbers were first reported Wednesday by The Washington Post.

“We’re kind of where we predicted we would be with completely uncontrolled spread of infection,” Jeffrey D. Klausner, clinical professor of medicine, population and public health sciences at the University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine, told the newspaper.

The virus has disproportionately affected people over the age of 85, who make up about 2% of the population, but accounted for more than 30% of COIVD-19-related deaths, Popular Science reported. However, the Post noted that the virus has also disproportionately claimed the lives of younger people in Black, Latino and Native American communities.

Among people between 40 and 64 years old, 1 in 240 Native Americans, 1 in 390 Hispanics and 1 in 480 Blacks have died of COVID-19, according to the Post. In the same age range, the virus has claimed the lives of 1 in 1,300 Asian and white people, the newspaper reported.

Public health officials have urged people to get vaccinated to curb the spread of COVID-19 as the highly transmissible delta variant and ongoing vaccine hesitancy caused a spike in viral infections across the county. Research has shown that vaccinated people can still spread the delta variant. However, health officials have stressed that the vaccine protects well against serious and life-threatening cases of COVID-19.

Nationwide, people aged 12 and older are eligible to receive any of the available COVID-19 vaccines. Clinical studies are ongoing for vaccination in younger people.

About 41.6 million cases of COVID-19 have been reported nationwide since the start of the pandemic, according to Johns Hopkins University. Globally, 226.6 million cases have been reported, resulting in 4.6 million deaths, according to Johns Hopkins.

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