You would think that living in one of the wealthiest, most prosperous nations in the world would mean longer lives for its citizens.

You would think wrong, according to this recent research, which shows that in terms of longevity, the United States is not the greatest in the world.

Australia holds that title, with the highest life expectancy among high-income, English-speaking nations.

Poverty and poor health are large influences, but the biggest one is the number of young Americans dying due to drug abuse, car accidents, and guns.

Researchers compared life expectancy in the US, Canada, Ireland, the UK, Australia, and New Zealand between 1990 and 2019. They broke down the data by gender, age, and 18 causes of death that included diseases and preventable deaths.

Jessica Ho, a co-author on the study, talks about why this is the case.

“One of the main drivers of why American longevity is so much shorter than in other high-income countries is our younger people die at higher rates from largely preventable causes of death, like drug overdose, car accident, and homicide.”

Americans also suffer the highest rate of death from cardiovascular disease, which can account for middle age deaths.

“Some of the latter could be related to sedentary lifestyle, high rates of obesity, unhealthy diet, stress and a history of smoking. It’s likely that those patterns  of unhealthy behaviors put Americans at a disadvantage in terms of their health and vitality.”

The data also showed that there are geographical inequalities in the States, with California and Hawaii residents faring much better than those born in the Southwest (by up to five years).

The UK dropped to the second-worst and Ireland leapt forward in recent years.

Basically, the researchers say other countries looking to lengthen life expectancy should copy Australia.

Australians do struggle with obesity, but they also have low rates of smoking and gun ownership, as well as low drug-related mortalities. These are due to “strong public health efforts,” according to the study.

“What the study shows is that a peer country like Australia far outperforms the US and was able to get its young adult mortality under control. It has really low levels of gun deaths and homicides, lower levels of drug and alcohol use and better performance on chronic diseases, the latter of which points to lifestyle factors, health behaviors, and health care performance.”

So yes, it’s a comment on the flailing healthcare situation in the US, too.

“Australia is a model for how Americans can do better and achieve not only a higher life expectancy but also lower geographic inequality in life expectancy.”

Easier said than done, I’m afraid.

It’s time for a revolution.

If you thought that was interesting, you might like to read about why we should be worried about the leak in the bottom of the ocean.