The study found that of those residing in the UK, people of Asian and black ethnic origins were at a higher risk of death as a result of COVID-19 as compared to the white population living in the country.
"It is very concerning to see that the higher risks faced by people from BME backgrounds are not attributable to identifiable underlying health conditions," said Professor Liam Smeeth, who is a professor of clinical epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
(Read more: COVID-19 fatality rate in patients with diabetes)
The researchers said that a number of health and socio-economic factors may also have a role in mortality risk—populations susceptible to higher mortality rates may have had a higher prevalence of underlying or pre-existing health conditions like heart diseases, diabetes and obesity.
Other underlying conditions that are said to increase the risk of mortality are asthma and other respiratory conditions, liver disease and kidney diseases, as well as neurological and autoimmune diseases.
(Read more: COVID-19 and obesity link)
Earlier studies and medical data have indicated that the prevalence of certain medical problems among the black and minority ethnic (BME) communities put some people at a higher risk of severe COVID-19. The findings of this study suggest people of these communities may also be at marginally increased the risk of mortality. More research needs to be done on this.
The researchers also cautioned against taking the cohort as fully representative of the entire population, as some patients may have been incorrectly thought to be COVID-19 positive. Conversely, some deaths may not have been classified as having occurred due to the infection, particularly when the outbreak was new and testing was not as rampant. (A cohort is a particular set or group of people used for the study.)
The preprint version of the same study, which was published in May 2020, had accounted for 5,707 deaths but the authors have built on their initial data by taking more fatalities into consideration since then.
Black and South Asian people, as well as those of mixed ethnic backgrounds, were 1.62 to 1.88 times more likely to die from COVID-19 than their white counterparts, after considering comorbidities and taking other factors into account.
The more deprived people from the same communities were even more likely to succumb to the disease by a factor of 1.8 times as compared to those from more privileged backgrounds. However, various social and economic factors were the cause of the high rate of fatality and not pre-existing medical conditions.
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