Sunday, December 9, 2018

US Life Expectancy Declines

It is 2017, and in the United States, hunger doesn't exist, and disease is insignificant and survivable.  Never in the history of humankind have people had access to better nutrition, healthcare, information, education, technology, etc. 

Despite this, we're not living as long as we used to.  Our life expectancy in 2017 is shorter than it was in 2016.

What's happening?  Mostly, we're overdosing, and we're committing suicide:

Some answers are obvious.  Easy access and high addiction rates to opioids have driven these numbers, as has the booming heroin trade.  However, this doesn't explain the whole thing, and I'd offer some likely culprits:

  • Our turning away from religion
  • The continuing war men, which leaving men feeling irrelevant and rudderless
  • Social media, in which our lives are under constant comparison, and in which hate is perpetually on display
  • The continuing push to make drugs "no big deal" 
  • Loneliness.  It's an absolute crisis, and drive by every point listed above
What do we do?  I don't see any of the trends I highlighted above abating anytime soon.  In fact, I'd expect that they will all continue to grow.

Which means our future life expectancy will continue to fall.

Amazing.

1 comment:

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