During 2015, renowned economist Jeffrey Sachs appeared in a video titled “The Fatal Flaw of the Anti-Vaccine Movement.” In the video, Sachs attempted to explain why Americans and people in other wealthy countries are much better off now in terms of health than they have ever been, and that this is due to technology, vaccines and other drugs.1 He said:
You know, we’re so lucky in the United States and other high income countries that we now live 80 years life expectancy. Many people can expect to live much longer than that. What a gift, compared to what life was like a century or two ago when life expectancy was 35 years or 40 years in the world, it’s doubled. And we live long and healthy lives because of the wonders of technology, vaccines and antibiotics, and knowledge about what causes disease and how to prevent it.1
In response to Sachs’ promotional video five years ago, I wrote the following comments in an article for The Vaccine Reaction:
For all of Prof. Sachs’ bravado about how fortunate Americans are to be living so long as a result of the drugs and technology, the fact is that he’s not even being completely forthright about how good we have it. Yes, Americans are living an average of almost 80 years. But of the nearly 320 million people in the U.S., about 90 million of them are living with chronic illness and disabilities. So we may be living longer, but we’re getting sicker, not healthier, as Prof. Sachs seems to imply.2
Since then, things have gotten worse. The number of people in the U.S. estimated to suffer from a chronic illness or disability is now at 133 million,3 4 which is roughly 40 percent of the country’s current population of 329 million. That figure, however, may actually be out of date. A 2016 study published in the journal Psychology, Health & Medicine estimated that 50 percent of Americans have at least one chronic health condition, mental disorder or substance-use problem.5
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), six out of 10 adults in the U.S. have a chronic disease and four out of 10 adults have two or more chronic diseases.6 That estimate is supported by a 2017 Rand study that found that “60 percent of American adults now live with at least one chronic condition; 42 percent have more than one.”7
Estimates for the number of children in America living with chronic health conditions now range between one out of three to one of two.8 9
Now, as it turns out, not only are Americans getting chronically sicker, they are also not living as long either, contrary to what Sachs suggested in his 2015 video. Ironically, by the end of 2015, it was reported by the media that U.S. life expectancy had dropped for the first time since 1993, from 78.9 years in 2014 to 78.8 years in 2015.10 11
The decline was not an aberration. As it turns out, it marked the beginning of a new trend. According to the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), life expectancy in the U.S. dropped for the second consecutive year in 2016 to 78.7 years. It was the first time the NCHS had registered a multi-year drop since 1962-1963.12 The downward trend continued for the third year in a row in 2017, with life expectancy dropping again to 78.6 years.13
Life expectancy data for 2018 is not publicly available yet.
So what is causing the downward slide in life expectancy among Americans? According to the CDC, it’s due largely to drug (notably opioids) overdoses and suicide.14 15 But there is also the view that the dramatically increasing rate of chronic illness may play a significant role
In an interview with Jay Bhattacharya, MD, PhD published in Stanford Medicine’s Scope, Dr. Bhattacharva was asked what he thought of the CDC’s emphasis on drug overdoses and suicide as fueling the decline in life expectancy. “My personal view is that these factors, although they might have a particular political salience right now, aren’t actually the main reasons for the decline that the CDC is reporting,” said Dr. Bhattacharva.16
Dr. Bhattacharva thinks that one way to address the life expectancy issue is to focus more on “targeting risk factors” that are behind the growth in chronic illnesses.16 He notes:
One thing that I think we need to be better at is distinguishing between primary prevention and secondary care. The latter we’ve gotten very good at, the former not so much. For instance, while chronic disease rates have risen dramatically in the U.S., disability from that chronic disease hasn’t to the same extent. We’re better at treating people who’ve had a heart attack or a stroke so that they don’t end up seriously disabled.16
In other words, modern Western medicine has been so preoccupied with dealing with acute events, like management and recovery from heart attacks and strokes, that it has paid relatively little attention to the as yet unexplained crisis of more people living with chronic illness that was in the making long before the Sachs video proclaiming everything is well due to the wonders of technology, vaccines and drugs. This crisis, however, has now become so severe that it is starting to have a negative impact on life expectancy.
LeeAnn Weintraub, a registered dietitian, would probably agree with Dr. Bhattacharva. Weintraub notes, “If we can shift from a society that puts its resources into treating the symptoms of disease to a society that considers the social, economic and environmental origins of health problems, we can make additional strides to live longer and better lives as a whole.”17
References:
1 Fierberg E. Watch Jeff Sachs destroy the anti-vaccine movement in under two minutes. Business Insider June 25, 2015.
2 Cáceres M. Jeffrey Sachs’ Quaint Destruction of the Anti-Vaccine Movement. The Vaccine Reaction June 27, 2015.
3 The Growing Crisis of Chronic Disease in the United States. Partnership to Fight Chronic Disease.
4 Wullianallur Raghupathi W, Raghupathi V. An Empirical Study of Chronic Diseases in the United States: A Visual Analytics Approach to Public Health. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2018; 15(3): 431.
5 Taylor & Francis. More than 50% of Americans now have at least one chronic health condition, mental disorder or substance-use issue. Science Daily Oct. 25, 2016.
6 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Chronic Diseases in America. Oct. 23, 2019.
7 Rand. Chronic Conditions in America: Price and Prevalence. Rand Review July 12, 2017.
8 Focus for Health. Chronic Illness and the State of Our Children’s Health.
9 Cáceres M. Half of America’s Kids Suffer from Chronic Illness and It’s Getting Worse. The Vaccine Reaction June 27, 2019.
10 Bernstein L. U.S. life expectancy declines for the first time since 1993. The Washington Post Dec. 8, 2016.
11 Stein R. Life Expectancy In U.S. Drops For First Time In Decades, Report Finds. NPR Dec. 8, 2016.
12 Tinker B. US life expectancy drops for second year in a row. CNN Dec. 21, 2017.
13 Bernstein L. U.S. life expectancy declines again, a dismal trend not seen since World War I. The Washington Post Nov. 29, 2018.
14 American Academy of Family Physicians. CDC Data Show U.S. Life Expectancy Continues to Decline. Dec. 10, 2018.
15 Ducharme J. U.S. Life Expectancy Dropped for the Third Year in a Row. Drugs and Suicide Are Partly to Blame. TIME Nov. 29, 2018.
16 Kenway J. Why is life expectancy in the U.S. going down? A Q&A. Scope Jan. 16, 2019.
17 Weintraub L. Americans are not living longer, healthier lives. Can functional medicine change that? Los Angeles Daily News Aug. 8, 2019.
21 Responses
Of course life expectancy is down. Why wouldn’t it be? First consider-the US has one of the highest infant mortality rates in the industrialize world:
– American Babies Are Less Likely to Survive Their First Year Than Babies in Other Rich Countries-https://time.com/5090112/infant-mortality-rate-usa/
Than you have the US unwilling to research and study why the US has one of the highest chronically ill child rates in the industrialized world-54%. 54% of children in the US sufferer from 1 or more chronic illness. That rate began to increase AFTER the increase in the number of vaccines given to children. The number of vaccine in the US went from 4 shots-DPT & Smallpox in 1940, never more than 1 per visit to 9 shots between the ages of 2 months-5 years, no more than 2 per visit in 1980 to 49 doses of 14 vaccines before the age of 6 in 2012 to where we are today 72 doses of 16 vaccine before the age of 18. It would be very simple to create a study to determine if vaccines play a role in chronically ill adults. Adults are not left out of the vaccine roulette. Smallpox vaccine has been linked to heart problems and Polio basically has mutated into what’s called Post Polio syndrome – all from the vaccine. Add to this mix the flu shot and the plethora of pharmaceutical drugs that are prescribed for everything the US population, if they are indoctrinated to follow their Dr’s every recommendation, is a chronically ill culture just waiting to happen.
But, but, but all vaccines are 100% safe and effective. Isn’t that what they keep telling us as Big Pharma and their lobbyists and supporters keep lining their pockets?
Red-pill you are absolutely correct. Vaccines play a big part in life expectancy decline especially for children. Not only do we have the highest infant mortality of all developed countries, from the Children’s Health Defense summary of the decline in children’s health, December 2019, the last of the 11 points is: “47% of American children are more likely to die before adulthood than children living in other developed countries.” Certainly the total environmental toxin load would be the cause.
If one looks at photos and videos from the 1940’s to today of everyday people, not actors, one can notice a significant change in the increase in obesity of the American population. A Dr. Mercola article on 12/11/2019, “Multiple Factors Liable for Daunting Death Rate in Midlife” and the one previous about “Why Do Scientists Defend Poison” points to many factors as the cause. Starting with vegetable oils never before used in human diets, to the flawed Ancel Keys study on fat in the diet leading to high carb diets, to the adoption of high fructose corn syrup replacing sugar, and the adoption of glyphosate weed killer in the 1970’s, one can see the change happening gradually at that time continuing into the 1980’s.
In the 1990’s the adoption of GMO crops doused with glyphosate weed killers greatly expanded as did the waistline of people and continues to this day. See the paper by Swanson et al, 2014, which associated the increase of many chronic diseases with the increase in GMO crops and glyphosate products. The series of six papers by Samsel and Seneff and those by Seralini’s team show how glyphosate wrecks human health. Increasing morbidity and mortality is caused by the medical profession, acknowledged to be the third leading cause of death in this country behind heart disease and cancer.
Contributing to this is the pharmaceutical industry with opioids, useless toxic drugs, (eg., Vioxx), psychotropic drugs given out like candy even to children. Dr. Mercola mentioned in the first referenced article that most of the mass school shooters are on these psychotropic drugs. Dr. Breggin and Dr. Gary Kohls discussed the same claiming that over 90% of the mass killers are either on or withdrawing from psychotropic drugs, starting with Charles Whitman in 1966 as the infamous “Texas Tower Sniper”. With the passage of the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act giving vaccine makers near full immunity from liability, the mandated child vaccine schedule increased significantly giving us a generation of chronically sick kids.
I’d like to add that with the weeds in farmers fields developing resistance to glyphosate some companies are adding dicamba or 2,4-D to the glyphosate weedkiller, increasing the toxic load to people and animals eating the crops, which have been genetically modified to resist the combination. 2,4-D is half of Agent Orange. In addition, many foods have chlorpyrifos, atrazine, and others applied to control insects, adding to the toxic load. Samsel and Seneff’s sixth paper on glyphosate found the chemical in vaccines, which then is directly injected into the body and carried into the brain. We have the sickest population of all developed countries and this is showing up in the decline in life expectancy.
69 vax’s for our kids so many when they are just infants and toddlers with developing minds and shooting it in where it bypasses the Blood Brain Barrier protection ….IS INSANE AND DELIBERATELY CAUSING BRAIN DAMAGE, THES CAUSING AUTISM AND TEH DUMBING DOWN AND SICKNESS OF A GENERATION OF KIDS THAT WILL GROW UP AND BE PERMANENTLY DAMAGED AND STUPID S OS THEY CAN BE EASILY DEPOPULATED. WHEN WILL PEOPLE WAKE UP AND DEMAND THE ARREST OF TEH DEVIANTS IN BIG PHARMA AND THEIR HENCHMEN EVIL BOUGHT OFF POLITICANS!
Thank you Redpill! This is what I have felt was going on but I did not have all the data to explain my gut feeling.
Well said!
I think the problem isn’t that the medical industry has paid too little attention to ‘secondary’ issues, but that is has paid TOO MUCH attention to them.
The medical industry has created its own huge market for ‘secondary care’ by CAUSING an epidemic of chronic conditions with its vaccines (starting the day of birth) and toxic chemical drugs, and then selling more drugs and vaccines to ‘treat’ the conditions caused by the first, and on and on until the ‘customer’ finally eventually dies after a sickly life.
It’s a brilliant profit model, if you are completely without a conscience.
Personally I think ‘chronic’ and ‘secondary’ issues are best prevented through promoting good health (eating good organic food, excercise, avoiding toxins), which basically also means avoiding the medical system and its toxic pharma-treadmill and bad advice (avoid butter, eat transfat margarine!).
In fact, chronic autoimmune issues are really hard to get rid of once your immune system has been short-circuited by vaccine damage. For example, I have eczema (among other issues) that started when I got the anthrax vaccine (and a bunch of other ones) in the military. I’m very health conscious now, and still it’s a constant struggle to keep it controlled. When it comes to chronic conditions like that, it’s much better to prevent them in the first place…
I see the medical system as an ENEMY of good health. EXCEPT in the case of primary acute emergency issues, as you mention in the article. No doubt, if you get stabbed, shot, etc, the medical system is amazing at saving your life. But otherwise, you are very likely to end up worse off if you let them handle your ‘health.’
They are there to make money, after all, not to ensure you have optimum health.
Redpill, Hear Hear!
@redpill, Well said. Red pilled here too, btw. I’d also like to see the rates of cancer and cancer deaths in those born around 1990 on. I bet that has skyrocketed too.
Between the poisons in vaccines and the poisons in our food it’s no wonder life expectancy is declining. There is a slow kill agenda here and elsewhere to reduce the population IMO.
Redpill, I can’t agree with you any more. You are spot on. I can’t help but think how the vaccine industry can consider that the number of vaccines given at one time can be safe & even effective in those little bodies. If they were to get the disease instead of the vaccine, they would get one at a time & those little bodies could develop a stronger, natural immunity to that one disease. How many kids of years ago (& I’m 68, so I am one of them) got more than one communicable disease at a time?
The “war on disease” is as big a failure as the “war on drugs”.
Among all countries, US life expectancy ranks around 46th. (according to a brief internet search)
Vaccines in massive amounts are certainly a cause of many human diseases and symptoms.
What I observe is so many people are consuming massive amounts of processed foods. Not just eating in restaurants and fast food arenas, but grab and go, microwaveable boxes found in endless rows of freezers in supermarkets and health food stores. I am a whole foods vegan but there are tons of ‘vegan’ processed foods as well. All these are loaded with added white salt. Many people are addicted to their soda’s, sports drinks, alcohol and other highly pH acidic substances. Selling vitamin and mineral pills is big business. Although supplements can help a deficiency they are not a substitute for whole foods–fresh vegetables, fruits, grains, beans, nuts, seeds and whatever else you feel needs including. Most people in the U.S. do not consume 4-6 servings of vegetables or fruit on a daily basis. If people have malnutrition their body will create symptoms that probably will be remedied by pharmacy drugs, not whole foods. Sadly the medical system does not focus on nutrition and prevention in medical school, nor does it teach doctors that THAT is where true health really comes from.
As is so common that it almost escapes attention, Sachs falls into the trap laid for him by the pharmaceutical company marketing experts — dividing the world into anti-vaxxers and others. There is no “anti-vaccine movement.” This is a fiction created by the marketers for the pharmaceutical industry. There are only vaccine safety advocates and anti-vaccine safety advocates. If you like the vaccine industry, for whatever reason, it’s better to call those who question it “anti-vaxxers” than to be labeled as an “anti-vaccine safety advocate”. But that’s what they are — anti-safety.
I feel that the chronically ill are under served due to the structuring of out insurance system . I love everyone getting health care but if it means the type and quality of the care is watered down what’s the point . It also seems that doctors are always saying the problem isn’t theirs to deal with it must be the other specialists area of concern . Except each one says the same thing . I’m not sure if this is true or false but it probably is a rumor but someone said doctors get bonuses if they keep testing down or within range . If there is any truth to that it is a system for failure , cherry picking gets done of who does and doesn’t get care . I guess it might be a good way to orchestrate a population and manipulate it . That’s the fear at least , government in healthcare might be a creepy thing .
Yep getting down to the point where we’re seeing what has come of the 1st fully vaccinated generation. I am a recipient of the Salk vaccine, circa 1962. Got a couple boosters after that IIRC. I remember the shot quite well. It was the second one I got. DPT was the first, but I was too young to remember it. I remember standing in that line back in 1962 with my kindergarten classmates. Many of them have long since passed, most due to one form of cancer or another. I can see various cancers in those who are still around. I feel so bad for my 2nd grade crush when I look at a today pic of her. She obviously has a lymphoma, and is about to get a hip replaced. Lymphomas and bone cancers kinda go hand in hand with SV40. I’ve had my own problems over the years. Been sickened by other school vaccines, and went into the military, so I got their vaccines too. I’ve been plagued by parasites thanks to SV40s inhibition of p53. Parasites that according to NIH don’t exist here! They’re full of something! Filarial parsites exist in animals here in N. America clear up to the Arctic Circle! That research goes back to the 1930s, so I don’t know where NIH gets their info! They’ll try to tell you the parasites are species specific, but they’re wrong. They’ll try to get into any warm blooded creature that they can and a human with corrupted p53 has no defenses. Ticks, mosquitoes, deer flies and horseflies can all spread them. It’s likely there are other insects that can too. Got some really interesting ones from skinning squirrels barehanded when I was young. A relative of monanema martini, which can cause symptoms akin to river blindness. I’m not blind yet, haven’t been diagnosed with any cancer, but I don’t deal with modern medical people.
I agree 100% with Redpill. As for the rest of us, eating whole foods as God intended, getting exercise or just moving 20-30 min a day, & getting 7+ hours of sleep helps keep your health on track. But most importantly to know – sugar feeds everything Bad in our bodies & that is what most people eat too much of, unfortunately.
if American “medicine” focused on health promoting lifestyles/practices rather than treating and suppressing symptoms-it would be out of business. So don’t ever expect that to happen
yes fear works very well on most to get the pharmaceutical companies richer (not the population healthier). If only all those people would use their brain for the true good of humanity, i.e. making sure everyone eats healthy (affordable) food, lives in comfortable and chemical free housing, and so on.. When will we get there? may be when we finally realize that not only our senior citizen do not live as long but also that our children and grandchildren are not either… who will be left to work and care for others.
The bible psalm 90:10 says the average life expectancy is between 70 and 80 years. “You may say I’m a dreamer but I’m not” John Lennon changes the entire quote. Partial information is used to manipulate. Media censors to manipulate. My body my child my choice is the new pro choice.
January 19, 2020 Video: The WHO’s Vaccine Experts Inadvertently Communicate to the World that “Vaccine Hesitancy” Makes Scientific Sense
Despite Its Recent Warnings About “Vaccine Hesitancy”, WHO “Experts” Acknowledge that the Claims About the Safety and Effectiveness of Vaccines were never Proven to be True.
https://youtu.be/s2IujhTdCLE