Life expectancy in the US has fallen for the third year in a row amid increasing drug overdose and suicide deaths. It’s the longest sustained decline since World War I and the Spanish Influenza pandemic, which killed tens of millions worldwide.
On average, the life expectancy of Americans declined by a tenth of a year from 2016, falling to 78.6 years, according to the Centers for Disease Control’s (CDC) National Center for Health Statistics, which measures data from the previous year. The rate of death increased from 729 deaths per 100,000 people in 2016 to 732 deaths, an increase of 0.4 percent.
According to World Health Organization data, the US ranks 31st in life expectancy worldwide, among the lowest in the industrialized world.
Driving the trend have been deaths by drug overdose and by suicide. Just over 70,000 people died from drug overdoses in 2017, an increase of 10 percent in a single year. Suicide deaths stood at 14 per 100,000 deaths in 2017.
Among drug overdose causes, synthetic opioids saw a 47 percent spike in a single year, with a total of 47,600 deaths being caused by synthetic opioids as well as other narcotics such as heroin.
Notably, deaths from legal painkillers did not increase in 2017.
The Washington Post notes that other factors contributed to an increased death rate last year, including a spike in influenza deaths as well as fatalities from chronic low respiratory diseases, Alzheimer’s disease and strokes.
Meanwhile, other common killers declined or continued their leveling-off tendency, as in the case of heart disease, the top killer of Americans.
