Latinos Have Longer Life Expectancy Than Non-Hispanics

A new study says Latin Americans have a lower rate of premature death compared to their non-Hispanic white counterparts in the U.S. regardless of being a resident of the country or not, according to an article by US News.

This is despite the recent findings by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) revealing that Latinos are the most physically inactive adults in the United States, in a report by Latin Post.

Throughout the years, researchers have theorized that a longer life expectancy among Latinos in the U.S. could be driven in part by a "healthy immigrant effect," which means healthier people may be more likely to immigrate to the U.S. than those in poorer health. This is despite the fact the Latinos are often confronted by socioeconomic disadvantages.

However, a new study, published Wednesday in JAMA Network Open, claims "theare may be a broader Latin American paradox" that extends far beyond U.S. borders.

Researchers from the National Institutes of Health analyzed some 22 million deaths among people 20 to 64 years old between 2001 and 2015 in different American countries including the U.S., Argentina, Belize, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru and Uruguay. They grouped the people in the U.S. into four namely whites, Africans Americans, Latinos and Puerto Ricans.

Researchers cited the six major causes of the premature death rate among women: circulatory, respiratory or digestive diseases; endocrine disorders such as diabetes; tumors; and external causes like assaults and accidental deaths. They found that the rate was lower in most of the Latin American countries and among U.S. Latinas than their white and African American counterparts in the U.S.

Men also showed similar results: Only Peruvians had a lower premature mortality rate than Latino men in the U.S., while white men in the U.S. landed in the middle of the pack and African American men had the second-highest rate, ahead of only Belize.

"Understanding how health patterns differ could provide important insights as to which behaviors contribute to long life," Dr. Yingxi Chen, an NIH epidemiologist and the study's lead author, tells U.S. News in an email.

Between 2001 and 2015, premature mortality rates decreased for most groups overall, including U.S. Latinos, African Americans and in most of the Latin American countries, which account for about 80% of the population in the region, the study found. The premature death rate among U.S. whites plateaued for both men and women, elevated among people 20 to 34 years old and stayed relatively flat among older groups.

Although heart disease and cancer remain to be the leading mortality driver in Latin America, with cancer still a major cause of premature death among women, the study found that there had been a decrease on the rate. Additionally, deaths among men has been attributed to "external causes" like violence and accidents.

"Concerning increases in the rates of premature mortality among certain populations in the Americas suggest a need to continue efforts against the major causes of death as well as to address emerging causes, such as obesity, with aggressive efforts," the study said.

Mortality rates are shaped by a country's social and economic landscape, according to a commentary on the study from researchers at New York University and elsewhere. For instance, Belize has the highest premature death rate for men among the countries studied in 2015, with 702 deaths per 100,000, homicides and other external deaths as the major cause. In 2019, unemployment rate in the Central American country hit 9.5%, and has become been infested with illegal drug trade.

The commentary noted, however, that it was "somewhat difficult to speak to an overall Latin American paradox," since the analysis excluded some countries, including Bolivia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Venezuela.

"It would be informative to explore population differences in resilience or health-promoting factors (eg, healthful diets or supportive networks) and risk factors (eg, smoking or drug use), as well as associations between acculturation and health," the authors wrote.

Furthermore, the study also didn't measure differences in health outcomes between U.S.-born and immigrant Latinos, or between U.S. Latinos of different countries of origin - issues which must be explored in future studies, according to Chen.