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NASA’s Return to the Moon Starts With Launching a 55-Pound Cube

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NASA’s Return to the Moon Starts With Launching a 55-Pound Cube

Within the coming years, NASA will probably be busy on the moon.

A large rocket will loft a capsule with no astronauts aboard across the moon and again, maybe earlier than the tip of summer season. A parade of robotic landers will drop off experiments on the moon to gather reams of scientific information, particularly about water ice locked up within the polar areas. A number of years from now, astronauts are to return there, greater than half a century because the final Apollo moon touchdown.

These are all a part of NASA’s Twenty first-century moon program named for Artemis, who in Greek mythology was the dual sister of Apollo.

Early on Monday, a spacecraft named CAPSTONE is scheduled to launch as the primary piece of Artemis to go to the moon. In contrast to what’s to observe, it’s modest in measurement and scope.

There received’t be any astronauts aboard CAPSTONE. The spacecraft is simply too tiny, about as large as a microwave oven. This robotic probe received’t even land on the moon.

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However it’s in some ways in contrast to any earlier mission to the moon. It might function a template for public-private partnerships that NASA might undertake sooner or later to get a greater bang for its buck on interplanetary voyages.

“NASA has gone to the moon earlier than, however I’m unsure it’s ever been put collectively like this,” mentioned Bradley Cheetham, chief government and president of Superior Area, the corporate that’s managing the mission for NASA.

Protection of the launch will probably be start at 5 a.m. Jap time Monday on NASA Tv. The rocket has to launch at a precise second, at 5:50 a.m., for the spacecraft to be lofted to the proper trajectory.

The total title of the mission is the Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Expertise Operations and Navigation Experiment. It can act as a scout for the lunar orbit the place a crewed area station will finally be constructed as a part of Artemis. That outpost, named Gateway, will function a means station the place future crews will cease earlier than persevering with on to the lunar floor.

CAPSTONE is uncommon for NASA in a number of methods. For one, it’s sitting on a launchpad not in Florida however in New Zealand. Second, NASA didn’t design or construct CAPSTONE, nor will it function it. The company doesn’t even personal it. CAPSTONE belongs to Superior Area, a 45-employee firm on the outskirts of Denver.

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The spacecraft is taking a gradual, however environment friendly trajectory to the moon, arriving on Nov. 13. If climate or a technical drawback causes the rocket to overlook that instantaneous launch second, there are further possibilities via July 27. If the spacecraft will get off the bottom by then, it can nonetheless get to lunar orbit on the identical day: Nov. 13.

The CAPSTONE mission continues efforts by NASA to collaborate in new methods with personal firms in hopes of gaining further capabilities at decrease value extra rapidly.

“It’s one other means for NASA to seek out out what it wants to seek out out and get the price down,” mentioned Invoice Nelson, NASA’s administrator.

Advance Area’s contract with NASA for CAPSTONE, signed in 2019, value $20 million. The trip to area for CAPSTONE is small and low-cost too: slightly below $10 million for a launch by Rocket Lab, a U.S.-New Zealand firm that may be a chief in delivering small payloads to orbit.

“It’s going to be beneath $30 million in beneath three years,” mentioned Christopher Baker, program government for small spacecraft know-how at NASA. “Comparatively fast and comparatively low value.”

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“I do see this as a pathfinder for a way we will help facilitate industrial missions past Earth,” Mr. Baker mentioned.

The first mission of CAPSTONE is to final six months, with the opportunity of a further 12 months, Dr. Cheetham mentioned.

The info it gathers will assist planners of the lunar outpost generally known as Gateway.

When President Donald J. Trump declared in 2017 {that a} prime precedence for his administration’s area coverage was to ship astronauts again to the moon, the buzzwords at NASA had been “reusable” and “sustainable.”

That led NASA to make an area station across the moon a key piece of how astronauts would get to the lunar floor. Such a staging website would make it simpler for them to succeed in totally different elements of the moon.

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The primary Artemis touchdown mission, which is presently scheduled for 2025 however prone to be pushed again, won’t use Gateway. However subsequent missions will.

NASA determined that the very best place to place this outpost can be in what is named a near-rectilinear halo orbit.

Halo orbits are these influenced by the gravity of two our bodies — on this case, the Earth and the moon. The affect of the 2 our bodies helps make the orbit extremely steady, minimizing the quantity of propellant wanted to maintain a spacecraft circling the moon.

The gravitational interactions additionally maintain the orbit at a few 90-degree angle to the line-of-sight view from Earth. (That is the near-rectilinear a part of the title.) Thus, a spacecraft on this orbit by no means passes behind the moon the place communications can be lower off.

The orbit that Gateway will journey comes inside about 2,200 miles of the moon’s North Pole and loops out so far as 44,000 miles away because it goes over the South Pole. One journey across the moon will take a few week.

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By way of the underlying arithmetic, unique trajectories like a near-rectilinear halo orbit are properly understood. However that is additionally an orbit the place no spacecraft has gone earlier than.

Thus, CAPSTONE.

“We predict we now have it very, very properly characterised,” mentioned Dan Hartman, program supervisor for Gateway. “However with this specific CAPSTONE payload, we will help validate our fashions.”

In follow, with none world positioning system satellites across the moon to pinpoint exact places, it would take some trial and error work out how greatest to maintain the spacecraft within the desired orbit.

“The largest uncertainty is definitely figuring out the place you might be,” Dr. Cheetham mentioned. “You by no means in area really know the place you might be. So that you at all times have an estimate of the place it’s with some uncertainty round it.”

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Like different NASA missions, CAPSTONE will triangulate an estimate of its place utilizing alerts from NASA’s Deep Area Community of radio dish antennas after which, if mandatory, nudge itself again towards the specified orbit simply after passing the farthest level from the moon.

CAPSTONE may also check an alternate methodology of discovering its place. It’s unlikely that anybody will spend the time and expense to construct a GPS community across the moon. However there are different spacecraft, together with NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, circling the moon, and extra will possible arrive within the coming years. By speaking with one another, a fleet of spacecraft in disparate orbits might in essence arrange an advert hoc GPS.

Superior Area has been creating this know-how for greater than seven years, and now it can check the idea with CAPSTONE sending alerts forwards and backwards with the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. “We’ll have the ability to decide the place each spacecraft are over time,” Dr. Cheetham mentioned.

Because it began creating CAPSTONE, Superior Area additionally determined so as to add a computer-chip-scale atomic clock to the spacecraft and examine that point with what’s broadcast from Earth. That information also can assist pinpoint the spacecraft’s location.

As a result of Superior Area owns CAPSTONE, it had the flexibleness to make that change with out getting permission from NASA. And whereas the company nonetheless collaborates carefully on such tasks, this flexibility generally is a boon each for personal firms like Superior Area and for NASA.

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“As a result of we had a industrial contract with our distributors, once we wanted to alter one thing, it didn’t must undergo an enormous overview of presidency contracting officers,” Dr. Cheetham mentioned. “That helped from a pace perspective.”

The flip facet is that as a result of Superior Area had negotiated a set payment for the mission, the corporate couldn’t go to NASA to ask for added cash (though it obtained additional funds due to provide chain delays brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic). Extra conventional NASA contracts generally known as “cost-plus” reimburse firms for what they spend after which add a payment — obtained as revenue — on prime of that, which supplies little incentive for them to maintain prices beneath management.

“As issues got here up, we had to determine methods to cope with them very effectively,” Dr. Cheetham mentioned.

That is much like NASA’s profitable technique of utilizing fixed-price contracts with Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which now ferries cargo and astronauts to and from the Worldwide Area Station at a a lot decrease value than the company’s personal area shuttles as soon as did. For SpaceX, NASA’s investments enabled it to draw non-NASA prospects fascinated about launching payloads and personal astronauts to orbit.

Till CAPSTONE, Superior Area’s work was largely theoretical — evaluation of orbits and writing software program for its advert hoc GPS — not constructing and working spacecraft.

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The corporate remains to be not likely within the spacecraft-building enterprise. “We purchased the spacecraft,” Dr. Cheetham mentioned. “I inform individuals the one {hardware} we construct right here at Superior is Legos. We’ve got a terrific Lego assortment.”

Prior to now couple of many years, tiny satellites generally known as CubeSats have proliferated, enabling extra firms to rapidly construct spacecraft primarily based on a standardized design during which every dice is 10 centimeters, or 4 inches, in measurement. CAPSTONE is among the many largest, with a quantity of 12 cubes, however Superior Area was capable of purchase it, nearly off-the-shelf, from Tyvak Nano-Satellite tv for pc Techniques of Irvine, Calif.

That also required a variety of problem-solving. For instance, most CubeSats are in low-Earth orbit, just some hundred miles above the floor. The moon is sort of a quarter-million miles away.

“Nobody’s flown a CubeSat on the moon,” Dr. Cheetham mentioned. “So it is smart that nobody’s constructed radios to fly CubeSats on the moon. And so we needed to actually dive in to know a variety of these particulars and really accomplice with a few totally different people to have the methods that might work.”

Mr. Hartman, the Gateway program supervisor, is worked up about CAPSTONE however says it’s not important to shifting forward with the lunar outpost. NASA has already awarded contracts for the development of Gateway’s first two modules. The European Area Company can be contributing two modules.

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“Can we fly with out it?” Mr. Hartman mentioned of CAPSTONE. “Sure. Is it obligatory? No.”

However he added, “Any time you may cut back error bars in your fashions is at all times factor.”

Dr. Cheetham is considering what might come subsequent, maybe extra missions to the moon, both for NASA or different industrial companions. He’s additionally considering farther out.

“I’m very intrigued about fascinated about how might we go do the same sort factor to Mars,” he mentioned. “I’m really fairly personally in Venus, too. I feel it doesn’t get sufficient consideration.”

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Amid state inaction, California chef sues to block sales of foam food containers

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Amid state inaction, California chef sues to block sales of foam food containers

Fed up with the state’s refusal to enforce a law banning the sale of polystyrene foam cups, plates and bowls, a San Diego County resident has taken matters into his own hands.

Jeffrey Heavey, a chef and owner of Convivial Catering, a San Diego-area catering service, is suing WinCup, an Atlanta-based foam foodware product manufacturing company, claiming that it continues to sell, distribute and market foam products in California despite a state law that was supposed to ban such sales starting Jan. 1. He is suing on behalf of himself, not his business.

The suit, filed in the San Diego County Superior Court in March, seeks class action status on behalf of all Californians.

Heavey’s attorney, William Sullivan of the Sullivan & Yaeckel Law Group, said his client is seeking an injunction to stop WinCup from selling these banned products in California and to remove the products’ “chasing arrows” recycling label, which Heavey and his attorney describe as false and deceptive advertising.

They are also seeking damages for every California-based customer who paid the company for these products in the last three years, and $5,000 to every senior citizen or “disabled” person who may have purchased the products during this time period.

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WinCup didn’t respond to requests for comments, but in a court filing described the allegations as vague, unspecific and without merit, according to the company’s attorney, Nathan Dooley.

Jeffrey Heavey is suing foodware maker WinCup, claiming that it continues to sell, distribute and market foam products in California despite a state law that was supposed to ban such sales starting Jan. 1.

(Luke Johnson / Los Angeles Times)

At issue is a California ban on the environmentally destructive plastic material, which went into effect on Jan. 1, as well as the definition of “recyclable” and the use of such a label on products sold in the state.

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Senate Bill 54, signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2021, targeted single-use plastic in the state’s waste stream.

The law included a provision that banned the sale and distribution of expanded polystyrene food service ware — such as foam cups, plates and takeout containers — on Jan. 1, unless producers could show they had achieved a 25% recycling rate.

“I’m glad a person in my district has taken this up and is holding these companies accountable,” said Catherine Blakespear (D-Encinitas). “But CalRecycle is the enforcement authority for this legislation, and they should be the ones doing this.”

The intent of the law was to put the financial onus of responsible waste management onto the producers of these products, and away from California’s taxpayers and cities that would otherwise have to dispose of these products or deal with their waste on beaches, in rivers and on roadways.

Expanded polystyrene is a particularly pernicious form of plastic pollution that does not biodegrade, has a tendency to break down into microplastics, leaches toxic chemicals and persists in the environment.

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There are no expanded polystyrene recycling plants in California, and recycling rates nationally for the material hover around 1%.

a Mallard duck swim in a Styrofoam polluted beach

A Mallard duck swims in water with Styrofoam polluting the beach on Lake Washington, Kirkland, Wash.

(Wolfgang Kaehler / LightRocket via Getty Images)

However, despite CalRecycle’s delayed announcement of the ban, companies such as WinCup not only continue to sell these banned products in California, but Heavey and his lawyers allege the products are deceptively labeled as “recyclable.”

In his suit, Heavey includes a March 15 receipt from a Smart & Final store in the San Diego County town of National City, indicating a purchase of “WinCup 16 oz. Foam” cups.

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Similar polystyrene foam products could be seen on the shelves this week at a Redwood City Smart & Final, including a 1,000-count box of 12-ounce WinCup foam cups selling for $36.99. Across the aisle, the shelves were packed with bags of Simply Value and First Street (both Smart & Final brands) foam plates and bowls.

There were “chasing arrow” recycling labels on the boxes containing cup lids. The symbol included a No. 6 in the center, indicating the material is polystyrene. There were none on the cardboard boxes containing cups, and it couldn’t be determined if the individual foam products were tagged with recycling labels. They were either obstructed from view inside cardboard boxes or stacked in bags which obscured observation.

Smart & Final, which is owned by Chedraui USA, a subsidiary of Mexico City-based Grupo Comercial Chedraui, didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Heavey’s suit alleges the plastic product manufacturer is “greenwashing” its products by labeling them as recyclable and in so doing, trying to skirt the law.

According to the suit, recycling claims are widely disseminated on products and via other written publications.

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The company’s website includes an “Environmental” tab, which includes a page entitled: “Foam versus Paper Disposable Cups: A closer look.”

The page includes a one-sentence argument highlighting the environmental superiority of foam over paper, noting that “foam products have a reputation for environmental harm, but if we examine the scientific research, in many ways Expanded Polystyrene (EPS) foam is greener than paper.”

Heavey’s suit claims that he believed he was purchasing recyclable materials based on the products’ labeling, and he would not have bought the items had they not been advertised as such.

WinCup, which is owned by Atar Capital, a Los Angeles-based global private investment firm sought to have the case moved to the U.S. District Court in San Diego, but a judge there remanded the case back to the San Diego Superior Court or jurisdiction grounds.

Susan Keefe, the Southern California Director of Beyond Plastics, an anti-plastic environmental group based in Bennington, Vt., said that as of June, the agency had not yet enforced the ban, despite news stories and evidence that the product was still being sold in the state.

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“It’s really frustrating. CalRecycle’s disregard for enforcement just permits a lack of respect for our laws. It results in these violators who think they can freely pollute in our state with no trepidation that California will exercise its right to penalize them,” she said.

Melanie Turner, a spokesoman for CalRecycle, said in a statement that expanded polystyrene producers “should no longer be selling or distributing expanded polystyrene food service ware to California businesses.”

“CalRecycle has been identifying and notifying businesses that may be impacted by SB 54, including expanded polystyrene requirements, and communicating their responsibilities with mailed notices, emailed announcements, public meetings, and workshops,” she said.

The waste agency “is prioritizing compliance assistance for producers regulated by this law, prior to potential enforcement action,” she said.

Keefe filed a public records request with the agency regarding communications with companies selling the banned material and said she found the agency had not made any attempts to warn or stop the violators from selling banned products.

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Blakespear said it’s concerning the law has been in effect for more than six months and CalRecycle has yet to clamp down on violators. Enforcement is critical, she said, for setting the tone as SB 54 is implemented.

According to Senate Bill 54, companies that produce banned products that are then sold in California can be fined up to $50,000 per day, per violation.

According to a report issued by the waste agency last week, approximately 47,000 tons of expanded polystyrene foam was disposed in California landfills last year.

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How a Supreme Court win for public health bolstered RFK Jr. and threatens no-cost vaccines

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How a Supreme Court win for public health bolstered RFK Jr. and threatens no-cost vaccines

Public health advocates won a big case in the Supreme Court on the last day of this year’s term, but the victory came with an asterisk.

The decision ended one threat to the no-cost preventive services — from cancer and diabetes screenings to statin drugs and vaccines — used by more than 150 million Americans who have health insurance.

But it did so by empowering the nation’s foremost vaccine skeptic: Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

Losing would have been “a terrible result,” said Washington attorney Andrew Pincus. Insurers would have been free to quit paying for the drugs, screenings and other services that were proven effective in saving lives and money.

But winning means that “the secretary has the power to set aside” the recommendations of medical experts and remove approved drugs, he said. “His actions will be subject to review in court,” he added.

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The new legal fight has already begun.

Last month, Kennedy cited a “crisis of public trust” when he removed all 17 members of a separate vaccine advisory committee. His replacements included some vaccine skeptics.

The vaccines that are recommended by this committee are included as preventive services that insurers must provide.

On Monday, the American Academy of Pediatrics and other medical groups sued Kennedy for having removed the COVID-19 vaccine as a recommended immunization for pregnant women and healthy children. The suit called this an “arbitrary” and “baseless” decision that violates the Administrative Procedure Act.

“We’re taking legal action because we believe children deserve better,” said Dr. Susan J. Kressly, the academy’s president. “This wasn’t just sidelining science. It’s an attack on the very foundation of how we protect families and children’s health.”

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On Wednesday, Kennedy postponed a scheduled meeting of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force that was at the center of the court case.

“Obviously, many screenings that relate to chronic diseases could face changes,” said Richard Hughes IV, a Washington lawyer and law professor. “A major area of concern is coverage of PrEP for HIV,” a preventive drug that was challenged in the Texas lawsuit that came to the Supreme Court.

By one measure, the Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision was a rare win for liberals. The justices overturned a ruling by Texas judges that would have struck down the popular benefit that came with Obamacare. The 2012 law required insurers to provide at no cost the preventive services that were approved as highly effective.

But conservative critics had spotted what they saw was a flaw in the Affordable Care Act. They noted the task force of unpaid medical experts who recommend the best and most cost-effective preventive care was described in the law as “independent.”

That word was enough to drive the five-year legal battle.

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Steven Hotze, a Texas employer, had sued in 2020 and said he objected on religious grounds to providing HIV prevention drugs, even if none of his employees were using those drugs.

The suit went before U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor in Fort Worth, who in 2018 had struck down Obamacare as unconstitutional. In 2022, he ruled for the Texas employer and struck down the required preventive services on the grounds that members of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force made legally binding decisions even though they had not been appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate.

The 5th Circuit Court put his decision on hold but upheld his ruling that the work of the preventive services task force was unconstitutional because its members were “free from any supervision” by the president.

Last year, the Biden administration asked the Supreme Court to hear the case of Xavier Becerra vs. Braidwood Management. The appeal said the Texas ruling “jeopardizes health protections that have been in place for 14 years and millions of Americans currently enjoy.”

The court agreed to hear the case, and by the time of the oral argument in April, the Trump administration had a new secretary of HHS. The case was now Robert F. Kennedy Jr. vs. Braidwood Management.

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The court’s six conservatives believe the Constitution gives the president full executive power to control the government and to put his officials in charge. But they split on what that meant in this case.

The Constitution says the president can appoint ambassadors, judges and “all other Officers of the United States” with Senate approval. In addition, “Congress may by law vest the appointment of such inferior officers” in the hands of the president or “the heads of departments.”

Option two made more sense, said Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh. He spoke for the court, including Chief Justice John G. Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett, and the court’s three liberal justices.

“The Executive Branch under both President Trump and President Biden has argued that the Preventive Services Task Force members are inferior officers and therefore may be appointed by the Secretary of HHS. We agree,” he wrote.

This “preserves the chain of political accountability. … The Task Force members are removable at will by the Secretary of HHS, and their recommendations are reviewable by the Secretary before they take effect.”

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The ruling was a clear win for Kennedy and the Trump administration. It made clear the medical experts are not “independent” and can be readily replaced by RFK Jr.

It did not win over the three justices on the right. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote a 37-page dissent.

“Under our Constitution, appointment by the President with Senate confirmation is the rule. Appointment by a department head is an exception that Congress must consciously choose to adopt,” he said, joined by Justices Samuel A. Alito and Neil M. Gorsuch.

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Life expectancy in California still hasn't rebounded since the pandemic

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Life expectancy in California still hasn't rebounded since the pandemic

During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the virus caused life expectancy in California to drop significantly.

It’s now been over two years since officials declared the pandemic-related public health emergency to be over. And yet, life expectancy for Californians has not fully recovered.

Today, however, the virus has been replaced by drug overdoses and cardiovascular disease as the main causes driving down average lifespans.

A new study published in the medical journal JAMA by researchers from UCLA, Northwestern, Princeton and Virginia Commonwealth University finds that the average life expectancy for Californians in 2024 was nearly a year less than in 2019. The shortfall of 0.86 year signals that only about two-thirds of the state’s pandemic-era losses of 2.92 years have been reversed.

Using mortality data from the California Comprehensive Death Files and population estimates from the American Community Survey, the researchers calculated annual life expectancy from 2019 to 2024, breaking the figures down by race, ethnicity, income and cause of death.

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Although the COVID-19 virus was the primary factor in life expectancy declines during the pandemic’s peak, accounting for 61.6% of the life expectancy gap, its impact has significantly lessened. In 2024, COVID-19 accounted for only 12.8% of the life expectancy gap compared with 2019, while drug overdoses and cardiovascular disease contributed more — 19.8% and 16.3%, respectively.

For Black and Hispanic Californians, recovery has been even slower. Life expectancy for Black residents in 2024 remained 1.48 years below 2019 levels, while for Hispanic residents it was 1.44 years lower. In contrast, the gap for white residents was 0.63 year, and for Asian residents, who have the highest life expectancy in the state at 85.51 years, it was 1.06 years. Overall, the life expectancy for Black Californians in 2024 was under 73.5 years, more than a dozen years lower than that of Asian Californians.

Janet Currie, a co-author of the study and professor at Princeton University, noted that these disparities are especially striking. “You saw the very big hit that Hispanic people and Black people took during the pandemic,” she said, “but you also see that Black people in particular are still not caught up.” She added that although Hispanic populations saw a faster rebound, they too remain behind.

Income-based disparities in life expectancy persist in stark form. Californians living in the lowest-income census tracts (the bottom quartile) experienced a 0.99-year gap in 2024 compared with 2019, while those in the highest-income quartile had a slightly smaller 0.85-year gap. However, the overall life expectancy difference between these groups, 5.77 years, was nearly identical to the prepandemic gap of 5.63 years, suggesting that income-based health disparities persist even as pandemic impacts recede.

The study highlights drug overdoses as a primary post-pandemic-emergency driver of reduced life expectancy. Black Californians and residents of low-income areas were especially affected. In 2023, drug overdoses contributed nearly a full year (0.99 year) to the life expectancy deficit for Black Californians and over half a year (0.52) for residents of low-income areas.

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That said, there are signs that state and national efforts to address the overdose crisis may be yielding early results. The number for Black Californians declined to 0.55 year in 2024 while it declined to 0.26 year for residents in low-income areas; in the same time frame, the statewide number dropped from 0.4 year to 0.17 year.

Currie attributed the initial surge in overdose deaths in part to the pandemic itself; there were disruptions in access to treatment, and many Californians suffered greater isolation. While she welcomed the recent progress, she cautioned that the share of deaths attributable to overdoses remains high and emphasized that this was “one of the real bad consequences of the pandemic.”

Meanwhile, cardiovascular disease is now the leading contributor to life expectancy loss among high-income Californians. In 2024, it accounted for 0.22 year of the gap for the wealthiest quartile, more than COVID-19 did at 0.10 year. The authors note this is consistent with statewide rising rates of obesity, which may be playing a role.

Dr. Tyler Evans, chief medical officer and chief executive of Wellness Equity Alliance as well as the author of the book “Pandemics, Poverty, and Politics: Decoding the Social and Political Drivers of Pandemics from Plague to COVID-19,” emphasized how the pandemic exacerbated long-standing health inequities. “These chronic health inequities were further amplified as the result of the pandemic,” he said. While investments in social determinants of health initially helped mitigate some of the worst outcomes, he added, “the funding dried up,” making recovery harder for communities already at greater risk of poor outcomes.

Evans also pointed to a broader pattern of overlapping health crises that he described as a “syndemic,” a convergence of epidemics such as addiction, chronic disease and poor access to care that interact to worsen outcomes for historically marginalized populations. “Until we invest in that sort of foundation long term, the numbers will continue to decline,” he said. “California should be a leader in health improvement outcomes in the country, not a state that continues to have our survival decline.”

Although the findings are limited to California and based on preliminary 2024 data, the study provides an early glimpse into post-pandemic mortality trends ahead of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s national life expectancy dataset, expected to be published later this year. California, home to one-eighth of the U.S. population, provides valuable insight into how racial, ethnic and socioeconomic disparities continue to shape public health.

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Ultimately, the study highlights how although the most visible impacts of COVID-19 may have faded, their ripple effects, compounded by ongoing structural inequities, continue to shape life and death in California. The pandemic may have accelerated long-standing public health challenges, and the recovery, the study makes clear, has been uneven and incomplete.

Currie warned that further cuts to Medicaid and public hospitals could make these gaps even worse. “We know what to do. We just don’t do it,” she said.

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