American life expectancy rose again in 2022 after two years of sharp decline, but did not return to pre-Covid-19 pandemic levels, health authorities said Wednesday.
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With an increase of 1.1 years between 2021 and 2022, life expectancy at birth in the United States was 77.5 years last year, according to initial estimates from health authorities.
This improvement was “primarily due to the decline in mortality associated with Covid-19,” the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) wrote.
But this increase “does not fully compensate for the 2.4 year loss in life expectancy between 2019 and 2021,” they added.
Before the Covid-19 pandemic began in 2019, American life expectancy was 78.8 years.
The decline in mortality related to Covid-19 last year was partially offset by an increase in mortality related to flu or pneumonia, health authorities noted.
The difference in life expectancy between men and women decreased slightly to 5.4 years in 2022. Specifically, American women had a life expectancy of 80.2 years last year, compared to 74.8 years for men.
When considering different population groups, life expectancy for Native Americans was lowest in 2022 at just 67.9 years – compared to 72.8 years for Blacks, 77.5 years for Whites, 80 years for Hispanics and 84.5 years for Asians .
In a separate report, the health authorities examined in particular the number of suicides, which, according to preliminary figures, continued to rise in 2022 and reached around 49,450 suicides.
The suicide rate was 14.3 deaths per 100,000 people in 2022, the highest level since 1941, according to this report.
After hitting a low in 2000, the suicide rate has risen sharply in the U.S. – despite a slight decline in 2019 and 2020.
Recently, the United States created a hotline with a simple three-digit number (988) for people in distress.