US life expectancy hit an all-time high in 2024, CDC says

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. life expectancy rose to 79 years in 2024 — the highest mark in American history.

It's the result of not only the dissipation of the COVID-19 pandemic, but also waning death rates from all the nation's top killers, including heart disease, cancer and drug overdoses.

What's more, preliminary statistics suggest a continued improvement in 2025.

“It’s pretty much good news all the way around,” said Robert Anderson, of the National Center for Health Statistics at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which released the 2024 data on Thursday.

Life expectancy, a fundamental measure of a population’s health, is an estimate of the average number of years a baby born in a given year might expect to live, given death rates at that time.

For decades, U.S. life expectancy rose at least a little bit almost every year, thanks to medical advances and public health measures. It peaked in 2014, just shy of 79 years.

It was relatively flat for several years before plunging as the COVID-19 pandemic killed more than 1.2 million Americans. In 2021, life expectancy fell to just under 76 1/2 years. It has been rebounding since.

The data reflect not only a complete turnaround from the pandemic but also a lasting improvement in the drug overdose epidemic, said Andrew Stokes, a researcher at Boston University.

The bad news is that the U.S. still ranks below dozens of other countries, Stokes noted.

“There's a lot more to be done,” he said.

In 2024, about 3.07 million U.S. residents died, about 18,000 fewer than the year before. Death rates declined across all racial and ethnic groups, and in both men and women.

Heart disease remained the nation’s leading cause of death, but the death rate due to it dropped by about 3% for the second year in a row. A combination of factors are likely at play, including advances in medical treatments and weight management, said Dr. Sadiya Khan, who treats and studies heart disease at Northwestern University.

Deaths from unintentional injuries — a category that includes drug overdoses — fell the most, dropping more than 14% in 2024. COVID-19, which only a few years ago was the nation's No. 3 killer, in 2024 dropped out of the top 10.

COVID-19's fall meant suicide moved into the top 10, even though suicides in 2024 declined. Homicides fell that year, too, this week's report said.

Deaths statistics for 2025 are not finalized, but preliminary data suggest around 3.05 million deaths have been recorded. That number may grow as more death certificates are rounded up and analyzed, but Anderson said he expects last year will end up at least a slight improvement over the 2024.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

FILE - People are silhouetted against the sky at sunset as they run at Shawnee Mission Park, Sept. 26, 2024, in Shawnee, Kan. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel, File)

BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union appeared poised Thursday to sanction Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard over Tehran’s deadly crackdown on nationwide protests, further squeezing the Islamic Republic as it worries over a threat by U.S. President Donald Trump to potentially launch a military strike against it.

America has moved the USS Abraham Lincoln and several guided-missile destroyers into the Mideast, which can be used to launch attacks from the sea. Iran has kept up its own threats as well, saying it could launch a preemptive strike or broadly target the Mideast, including American military bases and Israel.

It remains unclear what Trump will decide about using force, though he has threatened to use it in response to the killing of peaceful demonstrators and over possible mass executions. At least 6,373 people have been killed in the protests, activists said.

But the move by Europe, long considered, will put new pressure on Iran as its economy already struggles under the weight of international sanctions. Its rial currency fell to a record low of 1.6 million to $1 on Thursday. Economic woes had sparked the protests that broadened into challenging the theocracy before the crackdown.

“This will put them on the same footing with al-Qaida, Hamas, Daesh,” the EU's top diplomat, Kaja Kallas said, using an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State group. “If you act as a terrorist, you should also be treated as a terrorist.”

Iran had no immediate comment, but it has been criticizing Europe in recent days as it considered the move, which follows the U.S. earlier sanctioning the Guard.

By EU law, sanctions require unanimity across the bloc’s 27 nations. That's at times hindered Brussels’ ability to flex its economic clout to crack down on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine.

For Iran, France had objected to listing the Guard as a terrorist organization over fears it would endanger French citizens detained in Iran, as well as diplomatic missions, which provide some of the few communication channels between the Islamic Republic and Europe and its allies. However, the office of President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday signaled Paris backed the decision.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said Thursday before the Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels that France supports more sanctions in Iran and the listing “because there can be no impunity for the crimes committed.”

“In Iran, the unbearable repression that has engulfed the peaceful revolt of the Iranian people cannot go unanswered,” he said.

Gambrell reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas speaks with the media as she arrives for a meeting of EU foreign ministers at the European Council building in Brussels, Thursday, Jan. 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)