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Health-adjusted life expectancy plummets

Canadians can expect 3.5 fewer years of good health compared to a decade ago, according to recent data published by Statistics Canada. Life expectancy has increased steadily in Canada and throughout the world for many decades, though with a noticeable dip around the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020. But it is one thing to live longer, and another to live healthier. The Statistics Canada report examined health-adjusted life expectancy (HALE), a measure of the number of years in good health an individual is expected to live. Comparing the period of 2000-2002 to 2010-2012, HALE increased by nearly two years, to 70.4. But fast-forward a decade later to 2023, and HALE has dropped to 66.9 years, erasing the gains from the previous decades. Factors that contribute to the drop include the thousands of annual deaths from drug overdoses, increased mental health challenges, increased obesity, more misuse of drugs and alcohol, and a strained healthcare system. Although other countries also experienced a drop, it wasn’t as significant. The World Health Organization reported a 1.6 year decrease for HALE during and after the pandemic internationally. And although Canada ranked 5th in the world in life expectancy in 1990, our ranking has plummeted to 25th today. The Statistics Canada study noted that Canadian females have a life expectancy of 84 years and a HALE of 67.7 years, while males have a life expectancy of 79.6 years and a HALE of 66.4 years. Scripture makes it evident that God sovereignly determines how many days we live (Ps. 139:16) and is the One who gives us health or takes it away (Jer. 30:17, Ps. 103:3). We also learn from passages like Proverbs 3:1-2 (“keep my commands in your heart, for they will prolong your life many years and bring you peace and prosperity”) that walking in line with God’s Word is good not just for our spiritual health but also our mental and physical health. This correlates with studies that find that those who regularly attend religious services live about four years longer than average and have a much lower (up to 33 percent less) risk of death at any given moment.