The United States’ life expectancy somewhat increased in 2022 after declining during the pandemic due to fewer Americans passing away from COVID-19.
The U.S. Centers for Prevention and Control of Diseases has released preliminary data on fatalities for 2022, indicating that the average American may now anticipate living to be 77.5 years old—”an increase of 1 year from 2021.”
The authors of the paper pointed out that “this improvement does not fully compensate the reduction of 2.4 years from longevity during 2019 and 2021,” when a global epidemic gripped the country.
Less Americans perished from COVID-19 in 2022 than during the epidemic, which accounts for almost 84% of the increase in life expectancy.
According to the data, the average life expectancy for men in the United States increased by 1.3 years in 2022, to reach 74.8 years.
That lags 5.4 years below the median life expectancy of women in the United States. American women should anticipate an average lifespan of 80.2 years in 2022. According to CDC data, women’s average life expectancy increased by 0.9 years in 2022.
According to the analysis, the groups most affected by the pandemic—minorities—saw the largest increases in lifespans in 2022.
For instance, the average life expectancy of Hispanic American men increased by 2.4 years; that of Black men and women increased by 1.5 years; and that of American Indians and Alaskan Natives increased by 2.3 years.
According to the authors of the research, “the [2022] boost in lifespan would have proved even greater when accounting for the compensatory impacts of increases in fatality due to the influenza and bronchitis” in 2022, along with an increase in infant deaths from “perinatal conditions.”
The National Center for Statistics on Health at the CDC released the study as a Vital Stats Rapid Release on November 29.
