None of this is surprising to me. But I can’t say it’s because I’ve been exposed to any first-hand experiences. In my immediate social circle, everyone between the ages of 25 and 64 seems to be bumping around like everything’s OK.
In the outer ring of my social circle, I know of someone in this demographic who is struggling from alcoholism and almost died. But she’s still alive at present.
It is not surprising to me that Americans are dying prematurely since I’m bombarded by news about how unhealthy we are and how unpleasant life is for the average American. If I didn’t hear this news on a regular basis, I have no doubt that I’d be under the belief that things have never been better.
So I guess I’m wondering how close to home does this news article hit for you? Have you witnessed an uptick of dead young people in your community? Do you feel like you will likely be another statistic?
Lost a brother in law in his 40s to cancer. A friend in his 40s to suicide. A friend in her 40s to breast cancer. Acquaintances - one heart attack (50s), one drug overdose (late 30s). I’ve been to more funerals for friends than my parents who are in their 70s.
I’m always shocked how many of my students have faced loss, of a parent, a sibling, aunts and uncles. Often they come up in a college essay, when I had no idea that they had lost a loved one. The causes are exactly what is detailed in the article: heart disease, cancer, diabetes, suicide, violence. But with poor kids, these things are fatal earlier–it’s uncles and aunts and parents dying in their 40s and 50s. This is one of the things schools in lower-income areas have to deal with–more of our kids have faced devastating loss, and they often have less resources to deal with it. Plus, for every dad killed by diabetes or depression or catastrophic injury/violence, there are 5 more that were rendered unemployed by the same thing.
No, not seeing it. Well much. A suicide recently. And a younger person’s drug related death. But that relativ e lack is because of where I live and the privilege bubble I live within.
The article references that these are mostly drug and suicide deaths and how they are concentrated:
Let’s state it even more clearly: if you are a poster living in an urban or suburban location you, like me, are not as likely seeing this as much as rural Americans do. There is a huge rural American mortality penalty.
Oh, I forgot one. I ran a Girl Scout troop from 1st grade through middle school. Six weeks before her high school graduation, one of my former Scouts killed herself.
Part of it is due to a larger social network, friend of a friend of a friend. As the OP mentioned, there’s his/her inner circle of friends and an outer circle of friends. When someone on this forum is ill or passes away we tend to count them as a friend, when in reality for the most part they’re just someone we know very little about online.
Most of the people I know who died between ages 25 and 64 were cancer deaths. Suicide is next, and I’ve always been surprised that suicide is more often than not one of the top 10 causes of death listed on CDC’s website, and that’s not just a recent finding. While we’re not at the top of the global list, we’re pretty close to the top when it comes to first-world countries. I’d also submit that some deaths that aren’t counted as suicides probably are. That’s fucked up, and we don’t seem to be anywhere near close to fixing it.
I’m kind of confused by what you’re referring to when you say “part of it”. Part of what? The research I linked to isn’t based on a survey (“How many people have died in your social circle?”), but on actual data (the US Mortality Database and CDC WONDER). Do you not believe the findings of this research?
Class of 1980 here, my data comes from our 20th reunion, out of 420 bodies I knew of 3 deaths, one got whacked by a drunk driver within weeks of graduation, one was killed by a sniper in Beirut, and the third had her brother come home and kill everyone in the house. I’m sure that more have passed beyond the rim since, but I haven’t heard of any more not coming down for breakfast.
In my family, out of 14 in my generation, we are down one, lost to breast cancer. (Current ages 60-40)
I just thought of two coworkers who died of breast cancer within the past couple years. One was in her 30/40s and the other was in her 50s. I didn’t know either of them well, but they seemed like lovely people.
Your OP ended with the question “So I guess I’m wondering how close to home does this news article hit for you? Have you witnessed an uptick of dead young people in your community? Do you feel like you will likely be another statistic?” and I posit that a larger social increases the odds of knowing someone how died earlier than expected.
This review and analysis have several limitations. First, mortality data are subject to errors, among them inaccurate ascertainment of cause of death, race misclassification and undercounting, and numerator-denominator mismatching.187,188 These are especially problematic in interpreting mortality rates in the American Indian and Alaska Native population, although disparities persist in this population even in studies that circumvent these challenges.189 Other limitations include the weak statistical power of annual state mortality rates and their inability to account for substate variation, the limits of age adjustment, age-aggregation bias, and the omission of cause-specific mortality data from before 1999.190 Purported rate increases may also reflect lagged selection bias.191 Second, errors in coding, such as the misclassification of suicides as overdoses,192 or changes (or geographic differences) in coding practices could also introduce errors. For example, some increases in maternal mortality rates may reflect heightened surveillance and the addition of a pregnancy checkbox on death certificates.193-195 Changes in coding or awareness may partly explain the increase in age-adjusted mortality rates from mental and nervous system disorders, an international trend.196 Third, state mortality rates may also reflect demographic changes, such as immigration patterns (and the immigrant paradox197-199) or the out-migration of highly educated, healthy individuals.5"
As DSeid notes, I live in a solidly middle-class, suburban area, as do most of my friends. So, I’m likely insulated from some of this trend.
But, that said:
In the past six months, I’ve lost two good friends to cancer. Both of them were under age 50, and both of them suffered from other health conditions which exacerbated things (one had MS, one had early-onset Alzheimer’s).
I’m 54 years old; my high school class graduated in 1983. In my class (a Catholic all-boys school, in Wisconsin), we had 75 boys. So far, we have suffered 6 deaths (all before age 50): two suicides (both related to substance abuse), one from a heart attack, one from cancer, one from complications from AIDS, and one in a snowmobile accident.
Considering that the rate of opiod overdose deaths has skyrocketed in recent years, I was not in the least surprised by this news. That, along with the high rate of gun deaths, is something that other developed countries do not share.
ETA: our lack of Universal Health Care is also a factor. We’re getting a triple whammy and it’s all our own doing.
My parents are both first borns. Their younger siblings are already dead (2/3) or in much worse health than my parents (⅓). My parents moved away from one of the listed states and probably had/have a much better situation than they would have had otherwise. Many people don’t like change, and when the jobs dried up, they couldn’t/wouldn’t adapt. Not willing to move, not willing to go back to school. Many of my cousins are underemployed and seem to be missing the drive to do something different.
Even though my parents to live in a relatively well-off are, they recently attended a funeral for their friend’s daughter. And they will not be surprised if the other daughter follows. Meth. It’s taking people from all walks of life.
It takes money to go back to school. That’s hard if you have no income because you lost your job. Sure, you can borrow the money, but that’s getting less popular now that student loans have become a gateway for debt slavery for those who did go back to school but still couldn’t find a better-than-retail job in a place like Indiana.
More personally, I have very few family left. Since 2007 I’ve lost both parents, the in-laws, my spouse, and two nephews under 30.
In my area, it seems to be traffic accidents, drugs, work accidents (steel mills, farming, and other heavy industry eats people), alcohol, and drugs. And we’re doing better than a lot of the rest of the state because Chicago helps boost the economy around here.
Yeah, going back to school? Unless it’s to get a GED, I’d advise against it. That’s what I did when I got laid off, and all I got out of it is $ 41,000 in debt that’s bankruptcy-proof.
Stupidest decision I ever made, and I wish I chose instead to highlight my thirty years of experience, although that would’ve put some employers off due to my age. I’ll be paying this useless shit off when I’m in a nursing home.
