For the First Time in Modern US History, Life Expectancy is Falling

The omnibus report in JAMA finds mid-life deaths are driving the decrease, but the cause remains murky.

The history of the industrialized world since 1950 has been one of continually increasing life expectancy, as technology and medicine advanced in the modern era. A decrease in life expectancy is a particular example of American exceptionalism and is brought into stark relief by this study, examining 70 years of data, appearing in the Journal of…