Wednesday, 14 December 2005
Life Expectancy Going Up
U.S. life expectancy has gone up to 77.6 years in 2003 from 77.3 in 2202, according to a new report released by the National Center for Health Statistics, and reported by the Kaiser Family Foundation.
That doesn’t mean we’re getting any healthier.
The report also revealed about half of U.S. residents ages 55 to 64 have high blood pressure, and two in five are obese. Since the last study in the early 1990s, baby boomers have entered the age group. Researchers found that while “42% of U.S. residents who were ages 55 to 64 in 1990s had high blood pressure, compared with 50% of baby boomers, and 31% of those in the 1990s group were obese, compared with 39% of baby boomers.
Says Amy Bernstein, lead author of the report, baby boomers are "a very large and fast-growing group whose situation now gives us a preview of what is to come. They are starting to develop major chronic disease health problems at the same time that employer-sponsored health care is retracting and the cost of care is increasing."
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