When we wrote our book, The War on Aging, we reported that the average life expectancy for American males was 78.8 years. In fact, our life expectancy has more than doubled from what it was 150 years ago simply because we have better hygiene, antibiotics, and medical procedures. But a recent headline caught my eye (and my breath):
U.S. Life Expectancy Continues To Fall
as Overdose and Suicide Rates Soar
Appearing in the Huffington Post the article reports, “American mortality rates have continued to rise alongside worrying upticks in overdose and suicide rates, according to three new government studies from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.”
While this is heartbreaking, it’s not what made me catch my breath. What did is the continuing trend in longevity:
Life expectancy dropped to 78.6 years in 2017, down from 78.7 in 2016, contributing to the longest-running decline in U.S. history since World War I, when a flu pandemic killed almost 700,000 people nationwide between 1915 and 1918.
How can this be, when over the past 100 years, medical science has managed to extend our lifespan from the early 40s to our late 70s and early 80s?
Top Ten Leading Causes of Death
- Heart disease
- Cancer
- Unintentional injuries
- Chronic lower respiratory diseases
- Stroke
- Alzheimer’s disease
- Diabetes
- Influenza and pneumonia
- Kidney disease
- Suicide
One other statistic that I think is important to note: the rate of death from synthetic opioids. Reportedly, death from fentanyl jumped by 71 percent between 2013 and 2017 and by 45 percent between 2016 and 2017 alone. The age groups particularly affected in 2017 spanned the 25-34 range, as well as 35-44 and 45-54.
This is important for seniors to note as we are commonly offered opioids to manage pain, especially following surgery.
What can we glean from this?
According to CDC director Rober Redfield,
“Life expectancy gives us a snapshot of the nation’s overall health and these sobering statistics are a wakeup call that we are losing too many Americans, too early and too often, to conditions that are preventable.”
Good News
It’s true: while we can’t expect medicine to fix everything, we can take action to extend our life expectancy. You see, it turns out longevity experts got it wrong. Instead of life expectancy being determined 90 percent by genes and 10 percent by lifestyle; it’s the other way around. If your parents lived into their 90s, you’ve been blessed with good genetics, so lucky you.
But what determines longevity is what you do with the genes you’ve got―in other words, your lifestyle and health habits. As healthy seniors we can shift our eating and exercise habits at anytime so that whatever comes our way we have a fighting chance. We can all become soldiers in the senior War on Aging.
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