ArticleArchives of public health = Archives belges de sante publique2021
The association between opioids, environmental, demographic, and socioeconomic indicators and COVID-19 mortality rates in the United States: an ecological study at the county level.
Article in Archives of public health = Archives belges de sante publique, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Urban and Rural Disparities in COVID-19 Outcomes in the United States: A Systematic Review.Medical care research and review : MCRR · 2025Pooled it
- Effects of the built environment and human factors on the spread of COVID-19: A systematic literature review.The Science of the total environment · 2022Pooled it
- Risk of COVID-19 infection and the associated hospitalization, ICU admission and mortality in opioid use disorder: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Addiction science & clinical practice · 2022Pooled it
- Ambient air pollution and COVID-19 risk: Evidence from 35 observational studies.Environmental research · 2022Pooled it
- A state-level analysis of macro-level factors associated with hospital readmissions.The European journal of health economics : HEPAC : health economics in prevention and care · 2024Article
- Trends in Fatal Opioid-Related Overdose in American Indian and Alaska Native Communities, 1999-2021.American journal of preventive medicine · 2024Observational
- Article
- Predicting premature discontinuation of medication for opioid use disorder from electronic medical records.AMIA ... Annual Symposium proceedings. AMIA Symposium · 2023Article
- COVID-19 vaccination coverage and vaccine hesitancy among people with opioid use disorder in Barcelona, Spain.Drug and alcohol review · 2022Article
- Impacts of Built Environment on Risk of Women's Lung Cancer: A Case Study of China.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- Similar COVID-19 incidence to the general population in people with opioid use disorder receiving integrated outpatient clinical care.Drug and alcohol dependence reports · 2022Article
- Ecological studies of COVID-19 and air pollution: How useful are they?Environmental epidemiology (Philadelphia, Pa.) · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
9 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundThe spread of the COVID-19 pandemic throughout the world presents an unprecedented challenge to public health inequities. People who use opioids may be a vulnerable group disproportionately impacted by the current pandemic, however, the limited prior research in this area makes it unclear whether COVID-19 and opioid use outcomes may be related, and whether other environmental and socioeconomic factors might play a role in explaining COVID-19 mortality. The objective of this study is to evaluate the association between opioid-related mortality and COVID-19 mortality across U.S. counties.
methodsData from 3142 counties across the U.S. were used to model the cumulative count of deaths due to COVID-19 up to June 2, 2020. A multivariable negative-binomial regression model was employed to evaluate the adjusted COVID-19 mortality rate ratios (aMRR).
resultsAfter controlling for covariates, counties with higher rates of opioid-related mortality per 100,000 persons were found to be significantly associated with higher rates of COVID-19 mortality (aMRR: 1.0134; 95% CI [1.0054, 1.0214]; P = 0.001). Counties with higher average daily Particulate Matter (PM2.5) exposure also saw significantly higher rates of COVID-19 mortality. Analyses revealed rural counties, counties with higher percentages of non-Hispanic whites, and counties with increased average maximum temperatures are significantly associated with lower mortality rates from COVID-19.
conclusionsThis study indicates need for public health efforts in hard hit COVID-19 regions to also focus prevention efforts on overdose risk among people who use opioids. Future studies using individual-level data are needed to allow for detailed inferences.
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