scholarly journals Occupation and COVID-19 mortality in England: a national linked data study of 14.3 million adults

2021 ◽  
pp. oemed-2021-107818
Author(s):  
Vahe Nafilyan ◽  
Piotr Pawelek ◽  
Daniel Ayoubkhani ◽  
Sarah Rhodes ◽  
Lucy Pembrey ◽  
...  

ObjectivesTo estimate occupational differences in COVID-19 mortality and test whether these are confounded by factors such as regional differences, ethnicity and education or due to non-workplace factors, such as deprivation or prepandemic health.MethodsUsing a cohort study of over 14 million people aged 40–64 years living in England, we analysed occupational differences in death involving COVID-19, assessed between 24 January 2020 and 28 December 2020.We estimated age-standardised mortality rates (ASMRs) per 100 000 person-years at risk stratified by sex and occupation. We estimated the effect of occupation on COVID-19 mortality using Cox proportional hazard models adjusted for confounding factors. We further adjusted for non-workplace factors and interpreted the residual effects of occupation as being due to workplace exposures to SARS-CoV-2.ResultsIn men, the ASMRs were highest among those working as taxi and cab drivers or chauffeurs at 119.7 deaths per 100 000 (95% CI 98.0 to 141.4), followed by other elementary occupations at 106.5 (84.5 to 132.4) and care workers and home carers at 99.2 (74.5 to 129.4). Adjusting for confounding factors strongly attenuated the HRs for many occupations, but many remained at elevated risk. Adjusting for living conditions reduced further the HRs, and many occupations were no longer at excess risk. For most occupations, confounding factors and mediators other than workplace exposure to SARS-CoV-2 explained 70%–80% of the excess age-adjusted occupational differences.ConclusionsWorking conditions play a role in COVID-19 mortality, particularly in occupations involving contact with patients or the public. However, there is also a substantial contribution from non-workplace factors.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vahe Nafilyan ◽  
Piotr Pawelek ◽  
Daniel Ayoubkhani ◽  
Sarah Rhodes ◽  
Lucy Pembrey ◽  
...  

Objective: To estimate occupational differences in COVID-19 mortality, and test whether these are confounded by factors, such as regional differences, ethnicity and education or due to non-workplace factors, such as deprivation or pre-pandemic health. Design: Retrospective cohort study Setting: People living in private households England Participants: 14,295,900 people aged 40-64 years (mean age 52 years, 51% female) who were alive on 24 January 2020, living in private households in England in 2019, were employed in 2011, and completed the 2011 census. Main outcome measures: COVID-19 related death, assessed between 24 January 2020 and 28 December 2020. We estimated age-standardised mortality rates per 100,000 person-years at risk (ASMR) stratified by sex and occupations. To estimate the effect of occupation due to work-related exposures, we used Cox proportional hazard models to adjust for confounding (region, ethnicity, education), as well as non-workplace factors that are related to occupation. Results: There is wide variation between occupations in COVID-19 mortality. Several occupations, particularly those involving contact with patients or the public, show three-fold or four-fold risks. These elevated risks were greatly attenuated after adjustment for confounding and mediating non-workplace factors. For example, the hazard ratio (HR) for men working as taxi and cab drivers or chauffeurs changed from 4.60 [95%CI 3.62-5.84] to 1.47 [1.14-1.89] after adjustment. More generally, the overall HR for men working in essential occupations compared with men in non-essential occupations changed from 1.45 [1.34 - 1.56] to 1.22 [1.13 - 1.32] after adjustment. For most occupations, confounding and other mediating factors explained about 70% to 80% of the age-adjusted hazard ratios. Conclusions Working conditions are likely to play a role in COVID-19 mortality, particularly in occupations involving contact with COVID-19 patients or the public. However, there is also a substantial contribution from non-workplace factors, including regional factors, socio-demographic factors, and pre-pandemic health.


Author(s):  
Adriana Pérez ◽  
Arnold E. Kuk ◽  
Meagan A. Bluestein ◽  
Hui Min Shirlyn Sia ◽  
Baojiang Chen

Earlier exposure to binge drinking and tobacco use is associated with higher odds of substance use disorders. Using national youth data from the PATH study, we prospectively estimate the age of initiating past 30-day use of (1) cigarettes, e-cigarettes, and binge drinking, and (2) cigarettes, cigarillos, and binge drinking. Cox proportional hazard models were used to estimate differences in the age of initiation by sex, race/ethnicity, and previous use of other tobacco products. By age 21, 4.4% (95% CI: 3.7–5.2) and 2.0% (95% CI: 1.2–2.8) of youth reported initiation of past 30-day use outcomes (1) and (2), respectively. After controlling for sex and previous use of other tobacco products, statistically significant differences in the age of initiation by race/ethnicity were found for each outcome: Hispanic and non-Hispanic Black youth were less likely than non-Hispanic White youth to initiate past 30-day use of both outcomes (1) and (2) at earlier ages. Although the initiation of both outcomes remained relatively low by age 21, these incidences represent 1.56 million and 700,000 youth, respectively. This study provides the public with evidence to identify the particular ages at which education campaigns may be most effective to prevent youth from initiating these three substances. Further research is needed to estimate the age of initiation of other dual tobacco use patterns with binge drinking.


2021 ◽  
Vol 20 ◽  
pp. 153303382110049
Author(s):  
Tao Ran ◽  
ZhiJi Chen ◽  
LiWen Zhao ◽  
Wei Ran ◽  
JinYu Fan ◽  
...  

Background and Objective: Gastric cancer (GC) is a common tumor malignancy with high incidence and poor prognosis. Laminin is an indispensable component of basement membrane and extracellular matrix, which is responsible for bridging the internal and external environment of cells and transmitting signals. This study mainly explored the association of the LAMB1 expression with clinicopathological characteristics and prognosis in gastric cancer. Methods: The expression data and clinical information of gastric cancer patients were downloaded from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and Asian Cancer Research Group (ACRG). And we analyzed the relationship between LAMB1 expression and clinical characteristics through R. CIBERSORTx was used to calculate the absolute score of immune cells in gastric tumor tissues. Then COX proportional hazard models and Kaplan-Meier curves were performed to evaluate the role of LAMB1 and its influence on prognosis in gastric cancer patients. Finally, GO and KEGG analysis were applied for LAMB1-related genes in gastric cancer, and PPI network was constructed in Cytoscape software. Results: In the TCGA cohort, patients with gastric cancer frequently generated LAMB1 gene copy number variation, but had little effect on mRNA expression. Both in the TCGA and ACRG cohorts, the mRNA expression of LAMB1 in gastric cancer tissues was higher than it in normal tissues. All patients were divided into high expression group and low expression group according to the median expression level of LAMB1. The elevated expression group obviously had more advanced cases and higher infiltration levels of M2 macrophages. COX proportional hazard models and Kaplan-Meier curves revealed that patients with enhanced expression of LAMB1 have a worse prognosis. GO/KEGG analysis showed that LAMB1-related genes were enriched in PI3K-Akt signaling pathway, focal adhesion, ECM-receptor interaction, etc. Conclusions: The high expression of LAMB1 in gastric cancer is related to the poor prognosis of patients, and it may be related to microenvironmental changes in tumors.


2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (14) ◽  
pp. 3086
Author(s):  
Hiroki Kitakata ◽  
Shun Kohsaka ◽  
Shunsuke Kuroda ◽  
Akihiro Nomura ◽  
Takeshi Kitai ◽  
...  

Systemic inflammation and hypercoagulopathy are known pathophysiological processes of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), particularly in patients with known cardiovascular disease or its risk factors (CVD). However, whether a cumulative assessment of these biomarkers at admission could contribute to the prediction of in-hospital outcomes remains unknown. The CLAVIS-COVID registry was a Japanese nationwide retrospective multicenter observational study, supported by the Japanese Circulation Society. Consecutive hospitalized patients with pre-existing CVD and COVID-19 were enrolled. Patients were stratified by the tertiles of CRP and D-dimer values at the time of admission. Multivariable Cox proportional hazard models were constructed. In 461 patients (65.5% male; median age, 70.0), the median baseline CRP and D-dimer was 58.3 (interquartile range, 18.2–116.0) mg/L and 1.5 (interquartile range, 0.8–3.0) mg/L, respectively. Overall, the in-hospital mortality rate was 16.5%, and the rates steadily increased in concordance with both CRP (5.0%, 15.0%, and 28.2%, respectively p < 0.001) and D-dimer values (6.8%, 19.6%, and 22.5%, respectively p = 0.001). Patients with the lowest tertiles of both biomarkers (CRP, 29.0 mg/L; D-dimer, 1.00 mg/L) were at extremely low risk of in-hospital mortality (0% until day 50, and 1.4% overall). Conversely, the elevation of both CRP and D-dimer levels was a significant predictor of in-hospital mortality (Hazard ratio, 2.97; 95% confidence interval, 1.57–5.60). A similar trend was observed when the biomarker threshold was set at a clinically relevant threshold. In conclusion, the combination of these abnormalities may provide a framework for rapid risk estimation for in-hospital COVID-19 patients with CVD.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel C McFarland ◽  
Rebecca M. Saracino ◽  
Andrew H. Miller ◽  
William Breitbart ◽  
Barry Rosenfeld ◽  
...  

Background: Lung cancer-related inflammation is associated with depression. Both elevated inflammation and depression are associated with worse survival. However, outcomes of patients with concomitant depression and elevated inflammation are not known. Materials & methods: Patients with metastatic lung cancer (n = 123) were evaluated for depression and inflammation. Kaplan–Meier plots and Cox proportional hazard models provided survival estimations. Results: Estimated survival was 515 days for the cohort and 323 days for patients with depression (hazard ratio: 1.12; 95% CI: 1.05–1.179), 356 days for patients with elevated inflammation (hazard ratio: 2.85, 95% CI: 1.856–4.388), and 307 days with both (χ2 = 12.546; p < 0.001]). Conclusion: Depression and inflammation are independently associated with inferior survival. Survival worsened by inflammation is mediated by depression-a treatable risk factor.


2018 ◽  
Vol 119 (12) ◽  
pp. 1408-1415
Author(s):  
Lene A. Åsli ◽  
Tonje Braaten ◽  
Anja Olsen ◽  
Anne Tjønneland ◽  
Kim Overvad ◽  
...  

AbstractPotatoes have been a staple food in many countries throughout the years. Potatoes have a high glycaemic index (GI) score, and high GI has been associated with several chronic diseases and cancers. Still, the research on potatoes and health is scarce and contradictive, and we identified no prospective studies that had investigated the association between potatoes as a single food and the risk of pancreatic cancer. The aim of this study was to prospectively investigate the association between potato consumption and pancreatic cancer among 114 240 men and women in the prospective HELGA cohort, using Cox proportional hazard models. Information on diet (validated FFQ’s), lifestyle and health was collected by means of a questionnaire, and 221 pancreatic cancer cases were identified through cancer registries. The mean follow-up time was 11·4 (95 % CI 0·3, 16·9) years. High consumption of potatoes showed a non-significantly higher risk of pancreatic cancer in the adjusted model (hazard ratio (HR) 1·44; 95 % CI 0·93, 2·22,Pfor trend0·030) when comparing the highestv.the lowest quartile of potato consumption. In the sex-specific analyses, significant associations were found for females (HR 2·00; 95 % CI 1·07, 3·72,Pfor trend0·020), but not for males (HR 1·01; 95 % CI 0·56, 1·84,Pfor trend0·34). In addition, we explored the associations by spline regression, and the absence of dose–response effects was confirmed. In this study, high potato consumption was not consistently associated with a higher risk of pancreatic cancer. Further studies with larger populations are needed to explore the possible sex difference.


Circulation ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 125 (suppl_10) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yujie Wang ◽  
Wei Li ◽  
Liwei Chen ◽  
Ronald Horswell ◽  
Wenting Xie ◽  
...  

Background: Although coronary heart disease (CHD), heart failure (HF), stroke, and end-stage renal disease (ESRD) are major microvascular and macrovascular complications of diabetes, they are less clear for diabetic subgroups especially on those with middle and low income. Aim: To investigate racial disparities in the incidence of diabetic complications in middle and low income adults. Methods: We performed a prospective cohort study (1985-2010) on diabetic patients enrolled in the LSU Hospital-Based Longitudinal Study. Study cohorts included 89,353 diabetic patients (16,326 White men, 21,496 White women, 19,422 African American men and 32,109 African American women) who were 30 to 96 years of age. We calculated the gender specific age-standardized incident rates using the direct method to the year 2010 Census population. Cox proportional hazard models were used to compare racial or gender specific hazard ratios for CHD, HF, stroke and ESRD after adjustment for age, race, type of health insurance, family income, body mass index, smoking, systolic blood pressure, LDL cholesterol, HDL cholesterol, HbA 1c , estimated GFR, albuminuria, and drug treatments for diabetes, hypertension and hyperlipidemia. Results: During an average 4.0 years of follow-up, 16,935 CHD, 13,421 HF, 6,804 stroke, and 13,281 ESRD incident cases were ascertained. The age-standardized incident rates of the four diabetic complications are presented in table 1 . Compared with White diabetic patients, African Americans experienced higher rates of ESRD and lower rates of CHD, HF, and stroke. Female diabetic patients had lower rates of the four complications than males. Results of the Cox proportional hazard models confirmed the racial disparity and gender difference we found in the age-standardized incident rates. Conclusions: The results support the existence of racial differences in the incidence of diabetic complications in this population. Table 1 Age-adjusted incident rates of type 2 diabetes complications in the LSUHLS study Age-standardized incident rates White African American Male Female Male Female Coronary Heart Disease 101.6 (98.8-104.5) 62.0 (60.4-63.7) 50.7 (49.2-52.2) 44.4 (43.4-45.5) Heart Failure 54.9 (52.9-56.8) 41.9 (40.6-43.1) 43.4 (42.0-44.8) 38.4 (37.4-39.3) Stroke 22.1 (20.9-23.3) 20.7 (19.8-21.6) 19.9 (19.0-20.8) 18.5 (17.8-19.1) End-stage Renal Disease 43.3 (41.6-45.0) 33.4 (32.2-34.5) 51.4 (50.0-52.9) 35.2 (34.3-36.1)


Circulation ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 132 (suppl_3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacob P Kelly ◽  
Brad G Hammill ◽  
Jacob A Doll ◽  
G. Michael Felker ◽  
Paul A Heidenreich ◽  
...  

Background: In February 2014, coverage for cardiac rehabilitation (CR) was expanded by Centers for Medicare & Medicaid to include patients with chronic symptomatic heart failure (HF) on optimal medical therapy with ejection fraction <35%. Thus, we sought to characterize the patient population newly eligible for CR based on the expanded criteria and their associated outcomes. Methods: We analyzed the Get With The Guidelines-HF registry linked to Medicare claims data from 2008-2012 to assess three groups of patients age 65 or older: previously eligible (due to prior MI, CABG, stable angina, heart valve surgery, or PCI in the previous 12 months), newly eligible, and ineligible for CR. Ineligible patients met neither criteria. Incidence rate was calculated with Kaplan-Meier estimates and Cox proportional hazard models were used to determine the association of events. Results: Among 51,665 HF patients discharged alive, 27.2% (n=14,053) were newly eligible and 14.5% were previously eligible for CR (n=7477). Newly eligible patients were more likely to be black, have atrial fibrillation and EF < 35%, while having fewer previous hospitalizations than patients previously eligible for CR. Newly eligible and ineligible patients had similar risk for 1-year mortality compared with those previously eligible (adjusted Hazard Ratio [HR] 0.95, 95% Confidence Interval [CI] 0.88-1.02, p-value=0.13 and [HR] 1.05, 95% [CI] 0.98-1.13, p-value=0.17, respectively). However, newly eligible and ineligible patients had lower risk for 1-year readmission compared with those previously eligible (adjusted [HR] 0.89, 95% [CI] 0.85-0.93, p-value<0.001 and [HR] 0.94, 95% [CI] 0.90- 0.98, p-value<0.001). Conclusions: The extension of coverage for cardiac rehabilitation has tripled the potentially eligible HF population. As these newly eligible patients are at high risk for adverse outcomes, cardiac rehabilitation should be considered.


2019 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 148-176 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin Koehler ◽  
Holger Albrecht

This article presents a systematic analysis of military coups following popular mass uprisings in nondemocratic regimes, conceptualized as endgame coups. Drawing on our original, medium- n data set of revolutionary situations, we find that such endgame coups form a distinct type of military intervention in politics. Compared to regular coups, episodes of popular mass contestation prompt conservative interventions in politics of the military’s leadership aimed at preserving the regime’s authoritarian infrastructure. A systematic test of factors characterizing postcoup political trajectories is based on Cox proportional hazard models and provides empirical evidence in contrast to the widely held notion of “democratic coups.” Our findings reveal that endgame coups are conservative rollback coups, executed by military leaderships, that result in continued political instability and illiberal politics.


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