Coronavirus Toll On Younger Hispanics In RivCo, State: Data

RIVERSIDE COUNTY, CA — New numbers released Thursday in Riverside County show an uptick of 13 coronavirus-related deaths and 196 news cases, while a new study out of UCLA found that California's working-age Hispanic/Latinx residents are dying from the virus in greater numbers — a trend that shows up in county data.

According to Riverside University Health System, the county's COVID-19 death toll stands at 997 while total cases have risen to 51,734. Of the total cases, 41,323 people have recovered from illness, the data show. Hospitalizations were reported at 226, with 81 of those patients in ICU — an uptick of one and three, respectively, since Wednesday.

Data released Thursday by RUHS also show how COVID-19 deaths are occurring by age groups and race/ethnicity. While older age has been identified as a factor for increased risk of dying from COVID-19 complications across all races/ethnicities, the data show the county's younger Hispanic/Latinx community is dying in greater numbers compared to other groups:

Data provided by RUHS

Statewide, deaths from coronavirus among working-age Hispanic/Latinx residents have increased nearly five-fold in the past three months, according to research released Thursday by professors at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.

Research by Professors David Hayes-Bautista and Paul Hsu showed the increase in death rates in all Latinx age groups: young adult, early middle age and late middle age.

"In the early days of the pandemic, we worried about the skyrocketing death rate for the elderly," Hayes-Bautista, UCLA Fielding School of Public Health professor of health policy and management and distinguished professor of Medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, said. "Now the virus is falling on the working-age population, and the young Latino population is disproportionately represented in this demographic."

The professors used data furnished by the California Department of Public Health on COVID-19 deaths between May 11 and August 11, arranged by ethnicity and age group.

For Latinx adults ages 18-38, including college students and recent graduates, the death rate was low, but its rate of growth — 473 percent — was "alarming," the professors said.

In the early middle age category, ages 35-49 , the death rate went up by 386 percent, their research showed.

The death rate for late middle-aged Hispanic/Latinx residents, ages 50-69, spiked by 471 percent over the three-month period. At 54.73 deaths per 100,000, the death rate among this age group is nearly 25 times higher than the young adult rate of 2.12 and nearly four times higher than the early middle-aged rate of 14.23, said Hayes-Bautista and Hsu, assistant professor of epidemiology at Fielding School of Public Health and co-author of the report.

Their research determined the virus is taking a high toll on Latinx adults in their peak earning years.

"Anything that threatens the stability of our economy, like COVID- 19's inroads into the working-age population, needs to be taken seriously," Hayes-Bautista said.

The research does not analyze the reasons for the higher death rates among California's younger Hispanic/Latinx populations, but does hint that unsung essential workers are at greater risk.

"Different from the high-profile essential workers such as physicians, nurses, first responders, etc., the unsung essential workers are farm workers who feed California, truck drivers who transport the state’s goods, meat and vegetable packers, the grocery industry’s shelf stockers and checkout clerks, construction workers, automobile mechanics, gardeners and landscapers, bus drivers, office cleaners, nursing home attendants, and others who toil day and night to keep California functioning," the report states.

The report, "COVID-19: Associated Deaths in Working-Age Latino Adults," is published by the Center for the Study of Latino Health and Culture, part of UCLA Health.

—City News Service contributed to this report.