{"id":69169,"date":"2019-01-12T14:36:39","date_gmt":"2019-01-12T21:36:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=69169"},"modified":"2019-01-12T14:36:39","modified_gmt":"2019-01-12T21:36:39","slug":"deaths-of-despair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2019\/01\/deaths-of-despair.html","title":{"rendered":"“Deaths of Despair”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"LDS<\/a>
An LDS chapel in Miami, Florida (LDS.org)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Alas, one of my favorite political magazines, The Weekly Standard<\/em>, is now dead. \u00a0Before expiring, though, it published \u201c\u2018Deaths of Despair\u2019: What can be done about Americans\u2019 declining life expectancy?\u201d<\/a> \u00a0It\u2019s a sobering read. \u00a0What follows is drawn from it:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

On 29 November 2018, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (aka the CDC) released three disturbing reports. \u00a0One of them, the latest installment of an annual overview of \u201cMortality in the United States,\u201d disclosed that American life expectancy decreased in 2017 for the third year in a row. \u00a0This hasn\u2019t happened since 1918. \u00a0But 1918 was the year of the great Spanish Flu Pandemic and the last year of World War One. \u00a0It\u2019s scarcely surprising that lots of people died that year. \u00a0In fact, American life expectancy plunged a full fifteen years in 1918. \u00a0But it bounced back to an all-time high the very next year.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

America isn\u2019t a third world country. \u00a0We\u2019re affluent, well-nourished, secure from war. \u00a0Today\u2019s rising mortality rate is \u2014 according to the CDC director, Robert Redfield \u2014 \u201clargely driven by deaths from drug overdose and suicide.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The suicide rate has been higher in the past. \u00a0It spiked dramatically (and rather understandably) during the Great Depression. \u00a0But it has never risen so steadily over such a prolonged period of time. \u00a0The all-time American low for suicides was in 1999. \u00a0Since then, it has grown by 33 percent, to a rate that\u2019s as high as any since the 1930s.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Deaths from drug overdoses were rising by a steady three percent annually until 2015. \u00a0Suddenly, the rate accelerated to sixteen percent per year.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 2017, twenty-two out of every 100,000 Americans died by drug overdose. \u00a0Another fourteen out of every 100,000 died by suicide.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

There\u2019s plenty of data available, but, thus far, there are no convincing and comprehensive explanations for what Anne Case and Angus Deaton of Princeton University have called a surge of \u201cdeaths of despair.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s difficult to blame it all on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Does economic anxiety explain the crisis? \u00a0The CDC\u2019s companion report on suicide shows that the rate of suicide increased at the same pace before the recession of 2008 that it did during and after the recession. \u00a0Moreover, while suicides have increased among people old enough to have lost jobs to automation \u2014 one suggested explanation for the surge \u2014 they increased at the same rate among those too young to have held such jobs.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Is there a medical explanation? \u00a0From 1999 to 2014, the percentage of Americans on antidepressants increased by 65 percent, even without counting opioids and other painkillers. \u00a0Further, more Americans than ever before are in therapy. \u00a0In 2016, people who had been diagnosed with mental illness were over 25 percent more likely to receive professional treatment than in 2003. \u00a0And yet the rate of suicides continues to rise.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Some are beginning to suggest that declines in marriage rates, family solidarity, religious affiliation, and social engagement may correlate with, and play into, a rising rate of \u201cdeaths of despair.\u201d \u00a0Divorced people, for example, and especially divorced men, are at heightened risk of suicide.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Is the rise in such deaths linked in any way, whether simple or complex, to the rise in the religious \u201cnones\u201d?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Churches and families and certain other organizations provide an organic social safety net, and work powerfully against social isolation. \u00a0But, unfortunately, they can\u2019t be strengthened by increased taxation, medication, or government regulation.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 Alas, one of my favorite political magazines, The Weekly Standard, is now dead. \u00a0Before expiring, though, it published \u201c\u2018Deaths of Despair\u2019: What can be done about Americans\u2019 declining life expectancy?\u201d \u00a0It\u2019s a sobering read. \u00a0What follows is drawn from it: \u00a0 On 29 November 2018, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (aka […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n"Deaths of Despair"<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"    Alas, one of my favorite political magazines, The Weekly Standard, is now dead. \u00a0Before expiring, though, it published "'Deaths of Despair':\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" 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