2022 Healthy Aging Index

Life expectancy and healthy aging in the US

Despite spending the most on healthcare in the world, the United States falls well behind other world leaders in life expectancy rankings. After a historic drop in 2020, life expectancy in the US took another alarming hit in 2021, mainly due to the Covid-19 pandemic. And while life expectancy in other high-income countries has since increased, the overall life expectancy for the US population fell by almost 3 years (down to 76.1 years).

The blame for such poor rankings often falls on the US medical system. However, such measures also depend on a variety of socio-economic and behavioral factors that affect an individual’s health – diet, exercise, smoking, poverty, obesity, compliance with medical protocols, and many others. Up to date, multiple studies have, in fact, shown that a low-risk lifestyle can prolong life expectancy – and that most of these additional years of life are spent in good health.

As one of the leading health and wellness platforms in the industry – driven by the mission to help people lead healthier, longer, and more active lives – DoFasting was inspired to conduct its own study on healthy aging in the US.

The 2022 Healthy Aging Index is the first iteration of the study, aiming to highlight specific improvements that individual states could make to support a healthy aging population.