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DECEMBER
**23, 2021**
Jarod Facundo, Writing Fellow, on TAP
Another Crisis Surrounds Us
Life expectancy drops almost two years in the U.S., and it's not just
from COVID-19.
****
According to the Centers for Disease Control's National Center for
Health Statistics, life expectancy in the U.S. dropped
1.8 years from 2019 to 2020, the largest single-year drop since national
statistics were made available in 1933. The U.S. totaled 3,383,729
registered deaths, more than 500,000 higher than the year before. And
that's not even the worst statistic from the newly released mortality
data .
Death rates for every age group
15 years and over increased from 2019 to 2020. The increase continues
across men and women, regardless of race. However, rates sharply rose
most among Black and Latino men.
While heart disease and cancer remained the leading causes of death in
the U.S., COVID-19 took the third spot. The actual numbers could be
worse than what the data reflects, according to public-health experts
.
USA Today
reported this week that, as the virus ripped across our health care
infrastructure, it also exploited our outdated and decentralized
data-tracking processes for recording deaths.
**USA Today**'s investigation uncovered that nearly one million more
Americans died in 2020 and 2021.
Among the excess deaths, 195,000 could be untracked cases of COVID-19
due to the virus's symptoms being similar to complications from
diseases such as asthma, diabetes, hypertension, and Alzheimer's. It
doesn't necessarily suggest malicious intent perpetrated by medical
examiners and coroners juking the statistics, just a continuation of
overwhelmed and overencumbered workers in the medical field.
Thankfully, with what we know so far about the omicron variant data from
South Africa
,
this seems to be the least deadly variant so far, despite case counts
peaking past previous spikes. We'll have to see how it unfolds, and
whether increased transmissibility despite lower severity translates to
more overall hospitalizations and deaths.
But another crisis simmers below.
Fentanyl overdoses are now the number one killer among 18-45-year-olds
. Suicidal
ideation is at its highest rate on record among young people
. And I
cannot think of a single person on the national stage addressing that
issue with the seriousness it deserves. This year, I've seen more
young men I grew up with pass from either suicide or drug overdose than
any other previous year.
This has indirect links to the pandemic as well. A country devoting all
its public-health resources to stopping viral spread is one that
sacrifices attention to the ongoing opioid epidemic. And two years of
isolation, depression, and trauma is clearly leading to a mental health
crisis.
We're a sick country. But I'd like to end on a different note.
Last summer, I read George Scialabba's hybrid essay/memoir How to Be
Depressed . Unlike
anything else on the subject, the solutions he proposes are political
and economic ones, not just tweaks in the delivery of treatment. He
points out that "the successful assault on unions" coincides with
"increased poverty and economic insecurity." But being in a strong union
that allowed him to take time off when the disease took over, he said,
saved his life.
Scialabba mentions
**Prospect**co-founder Robert Reich's proposal to exempt the first
$20,000 of income from the payroll tax, which would save 130 million
American households an average of $5,000 a year. "Five thousand dollars
a year would save a lot of ordinary people a lot of grief, and
incidentally fix the economy."
~ JAROD FACUNDO
Follow Jarod Facundo on Twitter
[link removed]
New Kellogg Contract Opens the Floodgates for Exploitation
BCTGM and Kellogg ratified a new five-year contract earlier this week
after workers went on strike in October. Despite the short-term gains,
many workers are skeptical. BY JAROD FACUNDO
New York Democrats Try Again to End Some Fossil Fuel Subsidies
The state spends $1.6 billion a year subsidizing oil and gas. Lawmakers
are trying to eliminate about one-fifth of that spending. BY SAM
MELLINS
Washington Moves to Clear Unhoused People From Encampments
Social welfare advocates say these evictions are counterproductive and
cruel. BY ESTHER ERIKSSON VON ALLMEN
Altercation: The Sins of the Mainstream Media
The many reasons why the media is failing to reckon with the loss of our
democracy BY ERIC ALTERMAN
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