A new map based on official data reveals the shockingly low life expectancy of Americans.
Today, Americans can expect to live just over 76 years, far worse than any G7 country and even lower than countries like China and Colombia.
If we break it down by US state, the picture becomes even bleaker.
People in Mississippi, who have the lowest life expectancy, live only 70 years on average.
That’s younger than the average person living in Syria (72 years), Iran (74 years) and Palestine (73.5 years), according to the University of Oxford. Our world in data panel.
The map above shows life expectancy by state in the US.
And this chart shows how average life expectancy from birth has changed by year in the country.
People living in West Virginia (71 years) and Alabama (72 years) also had a lower life expectancy than those in the three Middle Eastern countries.
Rounding out the bottom five are Louisiana, at 72.2 years, and Kentucky, at 72.3 years.
On the other hand, the longest-lived state was Hawaii, where residents can expect to enjoy almost 80 years of life on average.
Health-conscious northern states like Massachusetts, Connecticut and New York, where people live to nearly 80, also made the top ten.
The data was released today by the CDC and estimates the life expectancy of babies born in 2021, the latest date available.
Nationally, the recession in 2021 was largely attributed to the Covid pandemic and the rise in fentanyl overdose deaths, a crisis unique to the United States.
Some experts have also blamed the country’s higher rate of gun crime than in other countries, with 32 percent of Americans owning a gun.
And higher rates of chronic diseases like obesity, which increase the risk of a host of life-shortening conditions later in life, including heart disease and high blood pressure.
Experts blame expensive health care, uninsured people and rising chronic diseases for the country’s faltering life expectancy figures (stock)
Bradley Schurman, a demographics expert who wrote The Super Age: Decoding our Demographic Destiny, told DailyMail.com that a “fairly complex web of factors” had led to the longevity gap between the North and South.
There are probably more reasons than I could list, but generally the South has less social protection than the North, so it is more difficult to access healthcare, for example. There are also higher rates of obesity.
‘In addition, the distance people have to travel to receive medical care can be much greater, for example.
‘For you and me, sitting in New York and DC, if one of us had a medical emergency right now, I can guarantee it would take 20 minutes to get from the call to the hospital, maybe less.
“But in some rural areas, it could take more than two hours – a dramatic difference.”
He also said higher rates of gun ownership in the South and depopulation, which has led to the closure of many rural hospitals, were also factors.
Between 2020 and 2021, official data showed that almost all states recorded a drop in life expectancy (39 out of 50).
Alaska recorded the steepest decline, with life expectancy falling 2.1 percent, along with West Virginia (1.8 percent) and New Mexico (1.5 percent).
At the other end of the scale, New Jersey experienced the fastest increase in life expectancy (up 1.5 percent), along with New York (up 1.3 percent).
About 460,000 people died from Covid in the United States in 2021 as the country was hit by new, more transmissible variants, reducing life expectancy in many states.
But in 2022, amid the arrival of vaccines, this figure dropped to 244,000 and in 2023 it was less than 100,000.
At the same time, US states have also been hit by a surge in opioid addiction deaths.
There were 106,700 drug overdose deaths in 2021, up 10 percent from 92,000 the previous year. The numbers have remained stable since then.
| State | Life expectancy at birth (years) | % change in one year |
|---|---|---|
| Hawaii Massachusetts Connecticut New York New Jersey Minnesota New Hampshire Rhode Island Vermont California Washington Utah Nebraska Wisconsin Colorado Iowa North Dakota Oregon Maryland Idaho Illinois Virginia Maine South Dakota Pennsylvania USA Delaware Florida Kansas Mountain Michigan Texas D.C. Snowfall Arizona Wyoming North Carolina Missouri Indiana Alaska Ohio Georgia South Carolina New Mexico Oklahoma Arkansas Tennessee Kentucky Louisiana Alabama West VirginiaMississippi | 79.9 79.6 79.2 79 79 78.8 78.5 78.5 78.4 78.3 78.2 78.2 77.8 77.8 77.7 77.7 77.6 77.4 77.2 77.2 77.1 76.8 76.7 76.6 76.4 76.4 76.3 76.1 76 75.8 75.7 75.4 75.3 75.1 75 75 74.9 74.6 74.6 74.5 74.5 74.3 73.5 73 72.7 72.5 72.4 72.3 72.2 72 7170.9 | -0.8% +0.6% +0.8% +1.3% +1.5% -0.3% -0.5% +0.3% -0.4% -0.7% -1% -0.4% +0.1% +0.1% -0.6% +0.2% +0.7% -1.4% +0.4% -1.2% +0.3% -0.8% -1.1% -0.1% -0.4% -0.6% -0.4% -1.4% -0.4% -1% -0.3% -1.1% 0% -1.2% -1.3% -1.3% -1.2% -0.5% -0.4% -2.1% -0.8% -1.3% -1.3% -1.5% -1.4% -1.3% -1.4% -1.2% -0.9% -1.2% -1.8%-1% |