COVID-19 risk to Jews

From last year's ONS report. These figures are before adjusting for age and multiple other factors

 

The increased risk of COVID-19 to the BAME community has been very widely discussed. There are doubts about the extent to which socio-economic factors, rather than genetic factors, explain the increased death risk and - as we pointed out in this article - there are also doubts about the way the risk is analysed and presented which can lead to exaggerations.  

Much less discussed is the increased risk to the Jewish community. In July we noted that the ONS report on COVID-19 risk by religion highlighted the increased risk to Muslims, even though the data suggested that Jews were the religious group with the highest risk of death. A new study provides further evidence that it is, indeed, Jews who have the highest risk of death from COVID-19.

 The study by Gaughan et al concludes

The majority of the variation in COVID-19 mortality risk was explained by controlling for sociodemographic and geographic determinants; however, those of Jewish affiliation remained at a higher risk of death compared with all other groups. 

Another study by Gaskell et al focuses on the orthodox Jewish community and confirms that there is an especially high prevelance of COVID-19 among this community. 

Thanks to Dr Robin Goodwin for alerting me to the new publications. 

Full details:

• Gaughan et al "Religious affiliation and COVID-19-related mortality: a retrospective cohort study of prelockdown and postlockdown risks in England and Wales" https://jech.bmj.com/content/early/2021/01/06/jech-2020-215694
  
• Gaskell, KM, Johnson, M, Gould, V, Hunt, A, Stone, NR, Waites, W, Kasstan, B, Chantler, T, Lal, S, Roberts, Ch, Goldblatt, D, Eggo, RM and Marks, M (2021). Extremely high SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence in a strictly-Orthodox Jewish community in the UK.  London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom. https://datacompass.lshtm.ac.uk/id/eprint/2084/ 
• Fenton NE, Neil M, McLachlan S, Osman M (2020), "Misinterpreting statistical anomalies and risk assessment when analysing Covid-19 deaths by ethnicity".  13140/RG.2.2.18957.56807. Also available here.