Daily Beast
Suicides and overdoses have pushed down the life expectancy of Americans for the third year running, with the suicide death rate hitting its highest level in 50 years.
The new figures show a continuation of the longest sustained decline in expected life span at birth in a century—the worst seen in the U.S. since World War I. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports there were more than 2.8 million U.S. deaths in 2017—nearly 70,000 more than the previous year and the most in a single year since the government began counting over a century ago.
