A baby born in the United States in 2004 will live an average of 77.9 years. That life expectancy ranks 42nd, down from 11th two decades earlier, according to international numbers provided by the Census Bureau and domestic numbers from the National Center for Health Statistics...Andorra, a tiny country in the Pyrenees mountains between France and Spain, had the longest life expectancy, at 83.5 years, according to the Census Bureau. It was followed by Japan, Macau, San Marino and Singapore...The shortest life expectancies were clustered in Sub-Saharan Africa, a region that has been hit hard by an epidemic of HIV and AIDS, as well as famine and civil strife. Swaziland has the shortest, at 34.1 years, followed by Zambia, Angola, Liberia and Zimbabwe.
A major factor in the USer ranking is the absence in the USofA national health care, and the lack for nearly 20 percent of the population of ANY health insurance. Also obesity is a major USer problem, with approximately two-thirds of the population "overweight." while almost one third of USers are clinically "obese." (Me? prob'ly 20-30 lbs too much.)
Another factor? Infant death/mortality rates: "Forty countries, including Cuba, Taiwan and most of Europe had lower infant mortality rates than the U.S. in 2004. The U.S. rate was 6.8 deaths for every 1,000 live births. It was 13.7 for Black Americans, the same as Saudi Arabia."
(That's right: Black children suffer mortality rates about TWICE those of Whites. Sooo-phahs, soooo-prahs!)
Nah, yer jist imagining: there's no racial inequality in the USofA anymore.
FWIW: It is my guess that the life-span will begin to decline, both world-wide and in the USofA as the effects of the toxic bath of noxious chemicals in the environment, which has been the invisible, but inescapable, and escalating part of the Lebensweldt since the '50s, begins to be felt.
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