Large swaths of the United States are showing decreasing or stagnating life expectancy even as the nation’s overall longevity trend has continued upwards, according to a county-by-county study of life expectancy over two decades. snip
The region where life expectancy is lowest, and in some places declining, begins in West Virginia, runs through the southern Appalachian Mountains and west through the Deep South into North Texas. Places of high life expectancy are more scattered. In addition to Northern Virginia they include counties in Colorado, Minnesota, Utah, California, Washington state and Florida.
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What surprised Murray and his team was that despite increased consciousness about disparities and per capita spending on health care that is at least 50 percent higher than European countries, the United States is falling farther behind them with each passing year.
“My expectation was that in the last decade we would at least be keeping up in terms of the pace of progress. But that’s not what’s happening,” said Murray.
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The county-based life expectancy for men ranged from 65.9 years in Holmes County, Miss., to 81.1 years in Fairfax County. Women had the longest life expectancy in Collier County , Fla., which includes Naples (86 years) and the shortest in Holmes County, Miss. (73.5 years).
Among states, Mississippi fares the worst. Of its 82 counties, 26 had life expectancies for men in 2007 that were roughly 66 to 69 years.
The most striking trend was the slowing of life expectancy in women. From 1987 to 1997, there were 314 counties with either a loss of life expectancy or no growth in it. From 1997 to 2007 there were 860 counties in which that was the case.
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