Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Average American Life Span Falls To Shortest Mark In Decades
NPR: American Life Expectancy Is Now At Its Lowest In Nearly Two Decades
The average life expectancy for Americans shortened by over seven months last year, according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That decrease follows an already big decline of 1.8 years in 2020. As a result, the expected life span of someone born in the U.S. is now 76.4 years — the shortest it has been in nearly two decades. (Noguchi, 12/22)
The Washington Post: U.S. Life Expectancy Fell In 2021 As Covid, Drug Deaths Surged
Notably, every age group in the U.S. — from young children to seniors 85 and older — saw a rise in its death rate. Men, women and most racial groups lost ground. In some previous years, even when overall life expectancy declined, some groups advanced. “This one, it’s sort of across-the-board bad news,” said Eileen Crimmins, a professor of gerontology at the University of Southern California who studies life expectancy around the world. “We’ve gone since 1996 without improving. That’s incredible, given how much we’ve learned about medicine, how much we’ve spent.” (Bernstein, 12/22)
USA Today: US Life Expectancy Continues To Fall, Erasing 25 Years Of Health Gains
What's killing Americans? Causes of death remained largely the same between 2020 and 2021, led by heart disease, cancer and COVID-19, all three of which occurred more often last year. Eight of the top 10 causes of death saw statistically significant increases in 2021 over 2020, including unintentional injury and stroke. Only Alzheimer's disease and chronic lower respiratory diseases declined among the leading causes of death.(Weintraub, 12/22)
More on the link to drug overdoses —
Los Angeles Times: Declining U.S. Life Expectancy Fell Further In 2021 Due To COVID And Drug Overdoses
The year 2021 saw 106,699 drug overdose deaths in the United States, the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics said in a separate report released Thursday. That’s a dramatic spike from 2020, a year in which fatal overdoses had already reached a historic peak of 91,799. (Healy, 12/21)
Politico: Covid-19 And Overdose Deaths Drive U.S. Life Expectancy To A 25-Year Low
The Covid-19 pandemic has had “a domino effect,” said Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, by “exacerbating the already very severe problem that we have in overdose deaths. ”The two crises, the Covid-19 pandemic and rising drug addiction and overdoses, are “a wake-up call” for government, added Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota. “It clearly is what’s cutting into the health of our communities, unlike almost anything we’ve seen before.” (Mahr, 12/22)
