COVID-19 was the third leading cause of death in the United States for 2020, according to the CDC

The COVID-19 pandemic pushed the total death toll in the United States last year to past 3.3 million, the country’s highest annual death toll, the government reported on Wednesday.

The coronavirus caused an estimated 375,000 deaths and was the third leading cause of death in 2020, after heart disease and cancer. Deaths from COVID-19 in the United States now exceed 550,000 since the start of the pandemic.

COVID-19 has displaced suicide as one of the top 10 causes of death, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report.

“The data should again serve as a catalyst for each of us to continue to do our part to reduce cases and reduce the spread of COVID-19 and get people vaccinated as quickly as possible,” Dr Rochelle Walensky said Wednesday, director of the CDC.

The death toll in the United States is increasing in most years, but last year’s death rate rose nearly 16% from the previous year. It is the biggest jump in a year since 1918, when the deaths of American soldiers during World War I and the influenza pandemic caused the death toll to jump 46% from 1917.

Overall, last year’s death rates were highest among blacks and Native Americans and Alaska Natives. The COVID-19 death rate was highest among Hispanics.

“Unfortunately, based on the current state of the pandemic, these impacts have remained into 2021 where we continue to see communities of color represent a disproportionate share of these deaths,” Walensky said.

Preliminary data from December suggested 2020 would be a particularly deadly year and the new CDC report showed it was even worse than expected. The new figures are still considered preliminary and are based on an analysis of death certificates.

Typically, the analysis of death certificates takes about 11 months. But the CDC has accelerated the schedule, according to the report, to meet “the pressing need for up-to-date, quality data during the global COVID-19 pandemic.”

In a separate report, the CDC responded to concerns about deaths wrongly attributed to COVID-19. The agency took a close look at the death certificates, finding that most of the names of COVID-19 also mentioned other contributing issues. They included conditions such as diabetes, known to increase the risk of serious illness, or conditions such as pneumonia occurring in the chain of events leading to death.

Only about 5% of death certificates only mentioned COVID-19, and this was more often the case when the person died at home.

The CDC said its review confirmed the accuracy of the death toll for COVID-19.

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