COVID-19 third leading cause of death in 2021, study says

(CNN) - The coronavirus was the leading cause of death for people between the ages of 45 to 54 last year, according to a new study published Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine.

The study also found that for 2020 and 2021, COVID-19 was the third leading cause of death overall in the United States.

Cancer and heart disease were the top two causes of death overall the past two years.

Researchers looked at death certificates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to gather the information.

According to data from the CDC on Tuesday, the omicron offshoot BA.5 is now the dominant subvariant in the U.S.

Several studies have shown that BA.4 and BA.5 are able to evade much of the immune protection from vaccines and prior infections, which is likely what is helping the virus spread so quickly.

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