Falling Life Expectancy in the USA: Guns, Suicide, Climate Change, and Opioids
Claudewell S. Thomas, MD, MPH, DLFAPA, is an established psychiatrist who is currently retired ,, He received his medical degree in 1956 at SUNY Downstate College of Medicine and specializes in social psychiatry, public health psychiatry, and forensic psychiatry. Dr. Thomas was board certified by the American Board of Psychiatry... more
According to the February/March 2019 issue of The Nation's Health, 2019 is the third straight year that the U.S. has experienced a fall in life expectancy as a whole. This includes most population groups. The decline is attributed in large measure to suicide and drug overdoses. The following is from that publication, "In November the National Center for Health Statistics published data briefs on three critical trends in public health. Life expectancy in the U.S. declined to 78.6 years in 2017 from 78.7 years in 2016. The rate of drug overdose deaths, largely driven by opioids, was 9.6% higher in 2017 than 2016 and 5.6 time the rate in 1999. And from 1999 to 2017 the rate of suicide increased 33 percent."
Air pollution is credited with reducing global life expectancy by two years. Pollution being a largely man made attribute, but considerably worsened by climate change (global warming). Gun utilization has been shown to increase mortality among white males above age 50 in association with methamphetamine use. Gun violence is shown to reduce life expectancy in the U.S. by two and one half years, but its impact on black life expectancy was far more profound. Carried out before the current explosion in gun violence (the last two years) the study found that shootings shaved close to one year off overall life expectancy but nearly three and one half years off black life expectancy.
Suicide by gun reduced black life expectancy by about six months, but shortening white life expectancy by more than one year. Kim Krisberg concludes her article by quoting the researchers, "Americans lose substantial years of life due to firearm injury." She quotes, "in the absence of comprehensive firearms legislation, targeted prevention programs and policies needed to mitigate the racial firearms injury gap."
The July issue of the Nation's Health reports that the fifteen year old National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) will begin collecting data from every state. It is important that such data be accessible to all of us at www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/nvdrs. Make sure that the funding is there and that the organization is functioning. Make your representatives aware and responsible.
