The article says the drop is due to people in their 20s and 30s are dying but why? The article states there is a big increase in overdose deaths but in percentage terms. Is this significant? Are deaths from fentanyl up from 1,000 to 2,000 or 100,000 to 200,000?
I also didn't find the word "obesity" anywhere in this article and I have to wonder how much this is a factor too.
As much as people might take this as "see how much life is better in [country X]", you still see people desperate to come here. Even in the EU, legal and illegal immigrants are much more likely to be headed to the UK and Germany.
I'm Australian but I've now lived in the US coming up on 9 years. The reason? As a software engineer, you can squeeze what would be a lifetime of savings in Australia into 10 years or less and that's hard to ignore.
The US is a pretty terrible place to live if you're poor however. And that goes far beyond life expectancy (but it of course plays into it).
Actually, if you're poor enough in the US and you live in a state like California you'll qualify for the best free healthcare in the world via Kiaser. Zero copay, pick your own doctors, specialists, eye exams, medication, etc. at zero cost. Then as soon as you get another job and start earning more than $1,400 a month(IIRC) you'll be kicked back into the regular system where no amount of money will ever buy you back into that awesome top tier that you got with the free plan.
A lot of young adults are graduating and finding zero hope of getting a full time job with benefits. Also they have large amounts of non-dischargeable student loans. In addition if they have any health problems they are no longer on parent's insurance and suffering disproportionately. I'm not surprised to see issues with drug use and suicide bringing down life expectancies. I also don't expect the trend to get much better in the next few years.
It's ~17,000 --> ~70,000 in the last twenty years.
Also, since a lot of these deaths happen early, they have a greater impact the life expectancy rate. One person dying 55 years earlier from a heroin OD has the same impact as 11 people dying 5 years earlier.
> The US is a pretty terrible place to live if you're poor however.
That's simply not true. The poor in the US have one of the world's most expensive welfare states. It's the next ~20%-25% or so above the bottom 25%, that have it worst. Those people don't get free access to healthcare because they earn too much.
The US has a very advanced welfare state and safety net for the poor. The US spends more of its economy on its welfare state than either Canada or Australia, and is in the upper half of the OECD in that regard. The US welfare state is also rapidly growing, whereas most other developed nations are seeing their welfare states shrinking.
The US poverty and homelessness rates are both superior to Canada and France. The US provides free healthcare for the bottom 25%, along with countless other massive programs involving food and shelter for the poor.
Folks, the equation is quite simple: the US is a high-risk, high (financial) reward society. Unlike the EU, it's optimized for the upside: you have many opportunities to create wealth for yourself (and sometimes for others). The EU, conversely, is optimized for the downside: you may not have too many opportunities to climb high, but even if you are the bottom, life can still be relatively comfortable.
So, for the averaghe person, the European system is likely (almost definitely) better.
For risk-craving entrepreneurs, the US is better (although some other places may have even more and bigger high-risk opportunities nowadays).
For you? You decide!
> So, for the averaghe person, the European system is likely (almost definitely) better.
I would strongly dispute this. According to the OECD, median household disposable income (adjusted for purchasing power) in the US is $10,000 per year, more than 20% higher than Germany, and $12,000 per year higher than the OECD average.
Health care and educational expenses don’t come close to wiping out that difference for the median person. The median American household has no student loan payment, and spends just a couple of thousand per year on out of pocket health care costs: https://www.kff.org/health-costs/press-release/interactive-c...
> For example, a person with employer coverage earning $50,000 annually spends on average $5,250, or roughly 11% of her income, on health care. This includes $800 per year in out-of-pocket costs, a $1,400 premium contribution, and $3,050 in state and federal taxes to fund health programs.
(The OECD disposable income statistic is after taxes, so the $3,050 in taxes above should be excluded from the comparison.)
The US system is optimized for the top 60%, and further optimized so the middle 40% doesn’t have to pay EU-level taxes to bankroll a safety net for the bottom 40%. It’s optimized at maximizing material comfort for the majority of people who never get seriously ill before they’re eligible for Medicare, as opposed to optimizing for raising the floor for people who get unlucky.
That's not actually true at all. The US has lower social mobility than most wealthy European countries. Thus, there are actually fewer opportunities for most people to create wealth for themselves compared to countries with more equality. It's hard to start a business, if, like the vast majority of people, you don't have a bunch of excess money sitting around.
I think this has to do with the Great Recession. Prolonged economic insecurity is associated with a poor mental health. And that is in turn associated with self medication with things like alcohol and opioids.
I'm curious why the broad result is also showing up in UK as another example (the opioid deaths in the US are making its situation even worse). There must be something in common occurring:
"Life expectancy progress in UK 'stops for first time'"
I see some people talking about Germany and France offering far better and cheaper healthcare.
But can you afford to look only at Germany and France? They operate in a broader framework of EU.
If you are going to compare services/living standards then must also directly compare Romania or Bulgaria to the US because Germany and France are able to provide cheap healthcare because their healthcare staff are willing to accept lower prices and how does it work? By importing labor from cheaper European countries. Presently, many doctors and nurses from Romania work in Germany without them good luck being able to maintain "cheap" healthcare.
If you cut off Germany and France from rest of the EU, the healthcare cost will likely shoot up far more than what it costs in US now.
There is downward pressure on wages in whole EU and this is why Europeans come to states for better employment opportunities, and better pay which can and does buy you better living standards if you are willing to spend the money you make but it seems not many want to do that, they want free healthcare in addition to taking large proportion of their wages home.
Lack of a stable career, terrible health insurance, high premiums, lack of community involvement, isolation from people, increased screen time and media consumption, hopelessness from always on sensational news, hopelessness in the face of global catastrophe to be coming near you due to ever worsening climate problem, student debt, not being able to afford a home, lack of healthy food options, diet and exercise misinformation, overprescribed medication, always on notifications never allowing you to relax, binge watching Netflix no time for brain to relax, shortened sleep cycles disrupting circadian rhythm.
I wonder what could possibly make people feel like shit and wanting to end it all...
I'm open the idea of various forms of drug legalization, but someone pointed out that the opioid epidemic (which is behind the decline in life expectancy) is arguably an experiment with legalizing heroin. The analogy isn't perfect, but that gave me pause.
Decriminalization (which is subtly different than legalization) of drugs isn't in conflict with preventing addiction and abuse by treating these as health problems, which is what they actually are.
The opioid epidemic was in significant part pushed forward by the unscrupulous marketing of prescription opioid manufacturers, and further catalyzed by the declining socioeconomic conditions in the areas most affected by the epidemic.
It isn't legalizing heroin, or else we'd have nationwide formal public health strategies for harm reduction. What we have is a strategy that seems like it was custom-built to maximize harm to public health.
We should hand over the reins of drug policy to the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps and task them with minimizing harm, instead of the abject failure we have now with police running the show.
The main point of drug legalization to me is to get people out jails and into proper support networks where they can get the medical treatment they need for an addiction without throwing their life away.
> I'm open the idea of various forms of drug legalization, but someone pointed out that the opioid epidemic (which is behind the decline in life expectancy) is arguably an experiment with legalizing heroin. The analogy isn't perfect, but that gave me pause.
Not in the slightest, because presumably heroin that you get from your pharmacist at Walgreens wouldn't be contaminated with fentanyl.
Heroin dealers are mixing in fentanyl because it’s extremely dense (in terms of doses per mass) and therefore easy to smuggle. People are ODing on fentanyl because those same properties make it hard to dose accurately. None of this would happen if opioids were legal.
No, it's not. Throwing addicts in prison does nothing to help addiction rates, and proper support systems to help addicts can't be created easily if heroin is illegal.
Two weeks, I had open heart surgery in my mid-20s in the US.
My main takeaway is this: those of us who work in tech or companies with decent health insurance are extremely fortunate.
In total (knock on wood that this doesn’t go up), I spent around $10k out of pocket.
This included more than surgery itself:
- multiple ER visits because of my deteriorating valve
- a LOT of dentist work (cleanings, fillings, wisdom teeth removal); these things increase your risk of stroke/heart attack after heart surgery.
- multiple visits with cardiologist and surgeon consultations
- pre-operation
- six days in the hospital recovering
To be honest, that’s a lot less than I expected to pay. However, I can’t help but think of people in less fortunate positions that would 1) get fucked by the bills if they had no insurance or 2) still go into debt despite having insurance. When you really think about it, all options are ridiculous for an operation that is literally do-or-die.
I’d also like to add a note on specialized vs ‘routine’ care here in the US. Or my experience with it, anyway.
All specialized treatment I received (dentist, heart surgery, cardiologist) was outstanding.
Routine cafe was awful, and ER visits were nothing short of ridiculous. I went in with chest pain/shortness of breath (that I now know was very serious). I waited for 6 hours. They gave me some blood work and an ekg and sent me on my way. I went again the next week, because my symptoms were getting progressively worse. Once again, I waited about 6 hours in the waiting room before getting an ekg and some blood work. Both visits were a complete waste of time. Luckily, I saw a cardiologist shortly after who gave me an echocardiogram and identified the valve issue.
This (the shortness of breath, dentist visits, surgery) was all done within the last two months. Were I in a less fortunate financial position, I probably would have hesitated to even go to the cardiologist. Especially after having thrown money at the ER for nothing.
It’s unfortunate how our healthcare system mirrors some sort of class-based hierarchy: If you can afford it, great! Else, get fucked.
> It’s unfortunate how our healthcare system mirrors some sort of class-based hierarchy: If you can afford it, great! Else, get fucked.
It's not widely known in the upper/upper middle classes but healthcare is more or less free if you're poor in the US (even for major things like cancer treatment). It's really the middle class that has it the worst as they don't qualify for free health care.
Edit:
Some additional information to back up my assertion:
Free or reduced cost stuff is all the rage these days. Yet we refuse to look in the mirror, where at least a partial explanation for the costs may be found. Quite unfortunate.
"Cancer Research UK says bowel, kidney, ovarian and liver cancers are more likely to have been caused by being overweight than by smoking tobacco. It says millions are at risk of cancer because of their weight and that obese people outnumber smokers two to one. But its new billboard campaign highlighting the obesity-cancer risk has been criticised for fat-shaming."
[..] "NHS England chief executive Simon Stevens said: "The NHS can't win the 'battle against the bulge' on its own. "Families, food businesses and government all need to play their part if we're to avoid copying America's damaging and costly example.""
My sense is that rural areas are harder to change, and probably far more prone to monopolies from service providers. The combination of higher costs of monopoly with higher rates of drug use might lead to more deaths.
Or, in another way, in the US, is being poor in a rural area better/worse/similar to being homeless in an urban one?
Unless I'm missing a parent reference you're referring to, the article explicitly mentioned this:
>In terms of deaths from suicide, Bernstein writes that there is a huge disparity between urban and rural Americans. The suicide rate amongst urban residents is 11.1 per 100,000 people, as opposed to rural residents’ 20 per 100,000.
"Life expectancy in Canada has stopped increasing for the first time in more than four decades, due largely to soaring overdose deaths in the Western provinces."[1]
This is a good starting point. This is all open access, and funded through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. This is done at the University of Washington Medical School, which is basically "as good as it gets" for a public medical school in the US. UW also has solid allied health departments. Their statistics department (even outside of the realm of health) is solid too: http://www.healthdata.org/us-health/publications
one of the side affects of google's search monopoly is the entire news/info media has been frozen in a textual model. facebook "helped" a little bit by requiring at least one good image to get shared, but that was in like 2012.
we get the content we get because of the algorithms, not because its a good way to present information.
> Speaking with NPR, disease prevention expert William Dietz of George Washington University stressed the links between overdoses and suicides. Both may occur amongst people “less connected to each other in communities” and are tied to a “sense of hopelessness, which in turn could lead to an increase in rates of suicide and certainly addictive behaviors.”
> McHugh echoes Dietz, concluding, “There's a tremendous amount of overlap between the two that isn't talked about nearly enough.”
Quick googling shows suicide deaths increasing 24% over 15 years, to 45,000 in 2014.
I heard an interview on Sam Harris’ podcast where the contention was teenage suicide rates are dramatically increasing.
Overdose deaths are at around 70,000 for 2017.
Overdose deaths and suicide are very connected, insofar as they can be traced to a feeling of hopelessness or meaninglessness.
Alcoholics are at a very high risk for suicide, for example.
There may be many other related causes of death: homicides, car crashes, and other destructive behaviors can still be viewed through a lens of lack of self worth or hope.
I think it is a huge mistake to treat it as a priori that economic factors drive this situation.
You can argue that even though we are all materially much more well off than 100 years ago, the awareness of relative status still has a profound psychological impact.
But I think looking at possible non-economic factors relating to psychological, philosophical, and spiritual health might provide alternate hypothesis that could help. I think policy makers and pundits avoid that because it seems much harder to address those issues via policy.
To me, though, the data implies a widespread crisis in sense of meaning.
Even in a country where people were well educated, the average life expectancy rising beyond some point wouldn't be a good thing. No idea where that optimum average life expectancy is, but it's entirely possible that we exceeded it and the drop noted here is actually a positive thing.
What is your rationale for capping average life expectancy? I hope not some reasoning based on costs due to old age since that is not a logical consequence. Advances leading to increased life expectancy could also lead to healthier / more productive old age.
If you live in the US and plan on staying alive in the long run, then you better spend a lot of time consulting HealthData.org--and analyzing the data there--to fit your particular situation.
Let's not even get in to how much health care actually costs in the US. But, if you want a completely solid read on that matter, get the book CASINO HEALTHCARE via Amazon. You will not be disappointed.
That being said, both me and my fraternal twin brother turned 30 a month ago. Unlike for most people, turning 30, together with my brother, was a very special milestone that I never expected to reach in life.
I have 2 rare autoimmune neurological diseases, that affect my peripheral nervous system (with one of them being very rare, with only case reports and cohorts published in the medical literature...and it was discovered relatively recently in the medical world...in the past 20 years via NIH research grants to physician-scientists) plus type 1 diabetes. It is all connected, but that is another story for another time.
The US health care system is unequipped to properly deal with people who have rare diseases. 6-7% of the general population has a rare disease, so having one, diagnosed or not, is actually common, and is even more common than the prevalence of ADHD in adults! This too is another story for another time, but I ended up self diagnosing the very rare one correctly, even though in my case the whole situation is beyond confounding, even compared to others with the same very rare condition that I have.
The issue is that for people with rare disease, the situation can be desperate, dismal, and even hopeless. In the case of rare disease, the social support structures in place within a society are literally just as important as the medical aspects of care.
We really do need highly specific plans and approaches for, rare diseases in general, for dealing with our unique situations. Compared the the United States, the European Union excels at this, and is the only world superpower that has a practical, pragmatic, and winning approach on the matter. For access to orphan drugs, Germany is the clear winner worldwide. For societal supports, Norway (which is not part of the EU but it is kind of part of the EU for the purposes here) is phenomenal and no other country compares, worldwide. Their government has extremely well developed programs, offices, and "medical homes" (go to contacts that are teams that coordinate all care) for rare disease patients, and for them only.
Remember, our situations are unique and different compared to other more common chronic illnesses, whether you want to believe this or not.
In fact, probably the biggest threat to my well being as somebody with rare disease: a government that does not reform, regulation wise, with the rapidly changing pace of technology. (And yes, all technology in general needs to be regulated, to varying degrees, whether you want to agree or not.)
Sorry to go off on a tangent. If I told the whole story, which would take quite awhile, you would be shocked, amazed, stunned, and impressed, all at the same time. I have cheated death many times, and I really shouldn't be alive. Both my doctors and I very much are aware of that. I certainly do not know why I am here, however I have purpose and I have meaning in my life.
I would love to go into more specifics, but I cannot without effectively writing a novel here.
The point is, on my 30th birthday, I came to the realization that I basically have to go to the EU (I am a dual US|EU citizen) to not only stay alive in the long term, but to potentially avoid having to suffer profoundly for the rest of my life. I cannot go in to the specifics here, though. But, trust me, the US health care system is not equipped to deal with rare disease properly, at all.
So, instead of celebrating the remarkable accomplishment of my 30th birthday with my best friend (I really shouldn't be alive), I was realizing that I had to leave the US for good, to stay alive. I cannot go in to specifics here, but this is not an exaggeration at all. It was profoundly sad for me, because I have to leave my family, who mostly live int he US, and basically start a new life.
[+] [-] cletus|6 years ago|reply
I also didn't find the word "obesity" anywhere in this article and I have to wonder how much this is a factor too.
As much as people might take this as "see how much life is better in [country X]", you still see people desperate to come here. Even in the EU, legal and illegal immigrants are much more likely to be headed to the UK and Germany.
I'm Australian but I've now lived in the US coming up on 9 years. The reason? As a software engineer, you can squeeze what would be a lifetime of savings in Australia into 10 years or less and that's hard to ignore.
The US is a pretty terrible place to live if you're poor however. And that goes far beyond life expectancy (but it of course plays into it).
[+] [-] beenBoutIT|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] foxyv|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rhino369|6 years ago|reply
Also, since a lot of these deaths happen early, they have a greater impact the life expectancy rate. One person dying 55 years earlier from a heroin OD has the same impact as 11 people dying 5 years earlier.
[+] [-] Tade0|6 years ago|reply
https://www.drugabuse.gov/related-topics/trends-statistics/o...
That's more than traffic fatalities.
you still see people desperate to come here.
Yes, mostly Mexicans, Chinese and Indians. If I hailed from such a country I would be desperate too.
[+] [-] adventured|6 years ago|reply
That's simply not true. The poor in the US have one of the world's most expensive welfare states. It's the next ~20%-25% or so above the bottom 25%, that have it worst. Those people don't get free access to healthcare because they earn too much.
The US has a very advanced welfare state and safety net for the poor. The US spends more of its economy on its welfare state than either Canada or Australia, and is in the upper half of the OECD in that regard. The US welfare state is also rapidly growing, whereas most other developed nations are seeing their welfare states shrinking.
The US poverty and homelessness rates are both superior to Canada and France. The US provides free healthcare for the bottom 25%, along with countless other massive programs involving food and shelter for the poor.
[+] [-] ilyaeck|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rayiner|6 years ago|reply
I would strongly dispute this. According to the OECD, median household disposable income (adjusted for purchasing power) in the US is $10,000 per year, more than 20% higher than Germany, and $12,000 per year higher than the OECD average.
Health care and educational expenses don’t come close to wiping out that difference for the median person. The median American household has no student loan payment, and spends just a couple of thousand per year on out of pocket health care costs: https://www.kff.org/health-costs/press-release/interactive-c...
> For example, a person with employer coverage earning $50,000 annually spends on average $5,250, or roughly 11% of her income, on health care. This includes $800 per year in out-of-pocket costs, a $1,400 premium contribution, and $3,050 in state and federal taxes to fund health programs.
(The OECD disposable income statistic is after taxes, so the $3,050 in taxes above should be excluded from the comparison.)
The US system is optimized for the top 60%, and further optimized so the middle 40% doesn’t have to pay EU-level taxes to bankroll a safety net for the bottom 40%. It’s optimized at maximizing material comfort for the majority of people who never get seriously ill before they’re eligible for Medicare, as opposed to optimizing for raising the floor for people who get unlucky.
[+] [-] cultus|6 years ago|reply
https://www.forbes.com/sites/aparnamathur/2018/07/16/the-u-s...
https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2018/02/14/american...
[+] [-] nraynaud|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bodono|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] EastLondonCoder|6 years ago|reply
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4741013/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4151244/
[+] [-] adventured|6 years ago|reply
"Life expectancy progress in UK 'stops for first time'"
https://www.bbc.com/news/health-45638646
"Life expectancy falls by six months in biggest drop in UK forecasts"
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/mar/07/life-expecta...
"Why is life expectancy faltering?"
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/jun/23/why-is-life-...
[+] [-] zaroth|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gingabriska|6 years ago|reply
But can you afford to look only at Germany and France? They operate in a broader framework of EU.
If you are going to compare services/living standards then must also directly compare Romania or Bulgaria to the US because Germany and France are able to provide cheap healthcare because their healthcare staff are willing to accept lower prices and how does it work? By importing labor from cheaper European countries. Presently, many doctors and nurses from Romania work in Germany without them good luck being able to maintain "cheap" healthcare.
If you cut off Germany and France from rest of the EU, the healthcare cost will likely shoot up far more than what it costs in US now.
There is downward pressure on wages in whole EU and this is why Europeans come to states for better employment opportunities, and better pay which can and does buy you better living standards if you are willing to spend the money you make but it seems not many want to do that, they want free healthcare in addition to taking large proportion of their wages home.
[+] [-] mrhappyunhappy|6 years ago|reply
I wonder what could possibly make people feel like shit and wanting to end it all...
[+] [-] mrosett|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] danans|6 years ago|reply
The opioid epidemic was in significant part pushed forward by the unscrupulous marketing of prescription opioid manufacturers, and further catalyzed by the declining socioeconomic conditions in the areas most affected by the epidemic.
[+] [-] mullingitover|6 years ago|reply
We should hand over the reins of drug policy to the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps and task them with minimizing harm, instead of the abject failure we have now with police running the show.
[+] [-] ausbah|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chimeracoder|6 years ago|reply
Not in the slightest, because presumably heroin that you get from your pharmacist at Walgreens wouldn't be contaminated with fentanyl.
[+] [-] djakjxnanjak|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sdinsn|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jwilbs|6 years ago|reply
My main takeaway is this: those of us who work in tech or companies with decent health insurance are extremely fortunate.
In total (knock on wood that this doesn’t go up), I spent around $10k out of pocket.
This included more than surgery itself:
- multiple ER visits because of my deteriorating valve
- a LOT of dentist work (cleanings, fillings, wisdom teeth removal); these things increase your risk of stroke/heart attack after heart surgery.
- multiple visits with cardiologist and surgeon consultations
- pre-operation
- six days in the hospital recovering
To be honest, that’s a lot less than I expected to pay. However, I can’t help but think of people in less fortunate positions that would 1) get fucked by the bills if they had no insurance or 2) still go into debt despite having insurance. When you really think about it, all options are ridiculous for an operation that is literally do-or-die.
I’d also like to add a note on specialized vs ‘routine’ care here in the US. Or my experience with it, anyway.
All specialized treatment I received (dentist, heart surgery, cardiologist) was outstanding.
Routine cafe was awful, and ER visits were nothing short of ridiculous. I went in with chest pain/shortness of breath (that I now know was very serious). I waited for 6 hours. They gave me some blood work and an ekg and sent me on my way. I went again the next week, because my symptoms were getting progressively worse. Once again, I waited about 6 hours in the waiting room before getting an ekg and some blood work. Both visits were a complete waste of time. Luckily, I saw a cardiologist shortly after who gave me an echocardiogram and identified the valve issue.
This (the shortness of breath, dentist visits, surgery) was all done within the last two months. Were I in a less fortunate financial position, I probably would have hesitated to even go to the cardiologist. Especially after having thrown money at the ER for nothing.
It’s unfortunate how our healthcare system mirrors some sort of class-based hierarchy: If you can afford it, great! Else, get fucked.
[+] [-] toasterlovin|6 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicaid
[+] [-] rrss|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] malvosenior|6 years ago|reply
It's not widely known in the upper/upper middle classes but healthcare is more or less free if you're poor in the US (even for major things like cancer treatment). It's really the middle class that has it the worst as they don't qualify for free health care.
Edit:
Some additional information to back up my assertion:
72.5 million people are covered by Medicaid: https://www.medicaid.gov/medicaid/eligibility/index.html
The vast majority of medical services are available for free to Medicaid members: https://www.medicaid.gov/medicaid/benefits/index.html
[+] [-] bluedino|6 years ago|reply
I’d imagine life expectancy would go up a bit too.
[+] [-] abstractbarista|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jodrellblank|6 years ago|reply
"Cancer Research UK says bowel, kidney, ovarian and liver cancers are more likely to have been caused by being overweight than by smoking tobacco. It says millions are at risk of cancer because of their weight and that obese people outnumber smokers two to one. But its new billboard campaign highlighting the obesity-cancer risk has been criticised for fat-shaming."
[..] "NHS England chief executive Simon Stevens said: "The NHS can't win the 'battle against the bulge' on its own. "Families, food businesses and government all need to play their part if we're to avoid copying America's damaging and costly example.""
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] examancer|6 years ago|reply
Single payer needs to happen, now. Medicare for All.
[+] [-] mr_tristan|6 years ago|reply
I found this from 2017: https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2017/p1019-rural-overdose...
My sense is that rural areas are harder to change, and probably far more prone to monopolies from service providers. The combination of higher costs of monopoly with higher rates of drug use might lead to more deaths.
Or, in another way, in the US, is being poor in a rural area better/worse/similar to being homeless in an urban one?
[+] [-] Frost1x|6 years ago|reply
>In terms of deaths from suicide, Bernstein writes that there is a huge disparity between urban and rural Americans. The suicide rate amongst urban residents is 11.1 per 100,000 people, as opposed to rural residents’ 20 per 100,000.
[+] [-] mighty_bander|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] refurb|6 years ago|reply
"Life expectancy in Canada has stopped increasing for the first time in more than four decades, due largely to soaring overdose deaths in the Western provinces."[1]
[1]https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/british-columbia/arti...
[+] [-] myth_buster|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] disabled|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cagenut|6 years ago|reply
we get the content we get because of the algorithms, not because its a good way to present information.
[+] [-] dang|6 years ago|reply
Good catch. Added above.
[+] [-] chabes|6 years ago|reply
> Speaking with NPR, disease prevention expert William Dietz of George Washington University stressed the links between overdoses and suicides. Both may occur amongst people “less connected to each other in communities” and are tied to a “sense of hopelessness, which in turn could lead to an increase in rates of suicide and certainly addictive behaviors.”
> McHugh echoes Dietz, concluding, “There's a tremendous amount of overlap between the two that isn't talked about nearly enough.”
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] 11thEarlOfMar|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] drinane|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] conanbatt|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] whiddershins|6 years ago|reply
I heard an interview on Sam Harris’ podcast where the contention was teenage suicide rates are dramatically increasing.
Overdose deaths are at around 70,000 for 2017.
Overdose deaths and suicide are very connected, insofar as they can be traced to a feeling of hopelessness or meaninglessness.
Alcoholics are at a very high risk for suicide, for example.
There may be many other related causes of death: homicides, car crashes, and other destructive behaviors can still be viewed through a lens of lack of self worth or hope.
I think it is a huge mistake to treat it as a priori that economic factors drive this situation.
You can argue that even though we are all materially much more well off than 100 years ago, the awareness of relative status still has a profound psychological impact.
But I think looking at possible non-economic factors relating to psychological, philosophical, and spiritual health might provide alternate hypothesis that could help. I think policy makers and pundits avoid that because it seems much harder to address those issues via policy.
To me, though, the data implies a widespread crisis in sense of meaning.
[+] [-] khuey|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] beenBoutIT|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jedharris|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] disabled|6 years ago|reply
The third leading cause of death--or at least what is believed to be the third leading cause of death--is preventable medical errors: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/05/03/4766361...
Let's not even get in to how much health care actually costs in the US. But, if you want a completely solid read on that matter, get the book CASINO HEALTHCARE via Amazon. You will not be disappointed.
That being said, both me and my fraternal twin brother turned 30 a month ago. Unlike for most people, turning 30, together with my brother, was a very special milestone that I never expected to reach in life.
I have 2 rare autoimmune neurological diseases, that affect my peripheral nervous system (with one of them being very rare, with only case reports and cohorts published in the medical literature...and it was discovered relatively recently in the medical world...in the past 20 years via NIH research grants to physician-scientists) plus type 1 diabetes. It is all connected, but that is another story for another time.
The US health care system is unequipped to properly deal with people who have rare diseases. 6-7% of the general population has a rare disease, so having one, diagnosed or not, is actually common, and is even more common than the prevalence of ADHD in adults! This too is another story for another time, but I ended up self diagnosing the very rare one correctly, even though in my case the whole situation is beyond confounding, even compared to others with the same very rare condition that I have.
The issue is that for people with rare disease, the situation can be desperate, dismal, and even hopeless. In the case of rare disease, the social support structures in place within a society are literally just as important as the medical aspects of care.
We really do need highly specific plans and approaches for, rare diseases in general, for dealing with our unique situations. Compared the the United States, the European Union excels at this, and is the only world superpower that has a practical, pragmatic, and winning approach on the matter. For access to orphan drugs, Germany is the clear winner worldwide. For societal supports, Norway (which is not part of the EU but it is kind of part of the EU for the purposes here) is phenomenal and no other country compares, worldwide. Their government has extremely well developed programs, offices, and "medical homes" (go to contacts that are teams that coordinate all care) for rare disease patients, and for them only.
Remember, our situations are unique and different compared to other more common chronic illnesses, whether you want to believe this or not.
In fact, probably the biggest threat to my well being as somebody with rare disease: a government that does not reform, regulation wise, with the rapidly changing pace of technology. (And yes, all technology in general needs to be regulated, to varying degrees, whether you want to agree or not.)
Sorry to go off on a tangent. If I told the whole story, which would take quite awhile, you would be shocked, amazed, stunned, and impressed, all at the same time. I have cheated death many times, and I really shouldn't be alive. Both my doctors and I very much are aware of that. I certainly do not know why I am here, however I have purpose and I have meaning in my life.
I would love to go into more specifics, but I cannot without effectively writing a novel here.
The point is, on my 30th birthday, I came to the realization that I basically have to go to the EU (I am a dual US|EU citizen) to not only stay alive in the long term, but to potentially avoid having to suffer profoundly for the rest of my life. I cannot go in to the specifics here, though. But, trust me, the US health care system is not equipped to deal with rare disease properly, at all.
So, instead of celebrating the remarkable accomplishment of my 30th birthday with my best friend (I really shouldn't be alive), I was realizing that I had to leave the US for good, to stay alive. I cannot go in to specifics here, but this is not an exaggeration at all. It was profoundly sad for me, because I have to leave my family, who mostly live int he US, and basically start a new life.