A NEW paper claims that whereas mortality rates for 45- to 54-year-olds around the world have steadily headed downwards since the late 1990s, in America mortality is on the up. The paper digs into death records to reveal that drug overdoses, alcohol poisoning and suicides are behind the headline rise. The less-educated are suffering most—between 1999 and 2013, deaths per 100,000 from such “external causes” among those with at most a high school degree increased by 69, compared with just 4 for those with a university degree. Had mortality rates remained on the downward path they followed between 1970 and 1998, half a million fewer lives would have been lost. By comparison, AIDS cost 650,000 American lives between 1981 and mid-2015.
Rising morbidity and mortality in midlife among white non-Hispanic Americans in the 21st century, by Anne Case and Angus Deaton
Source: United States http://ift.tt/1Nsf43x
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