U.S. life expectancy falls slightly in 2008

American life expectancy slipped slightly in 2008 to 77.8 years, the first dip since 2004, while stroke slid a notch to become the fourth-leading cause of death, U.S. health experts said on Thursday.

They said a baby born in 2008 could expect to live about one month less than one born in 2007, falling from a record high of 77.9 years in 2007.

The change is more likely a statistical blip than a significant shift, said Arialdi Minino, who led the study for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics.

"The issue with life expectancy is minuscule," Minino said, noting that was just one measure of a country's health.

His group also looked at death rates that had been adjusted for an aging population. In terms of the risks of dying in a given year, "2008 didn't change much from 2007," Minino said.

The CDC said that overall, women were expected to live 80.3 years and men 75.3 years.

"I think the more important story is the decrease in stroke. It's been the third-leading cause of death for 50 years since we invented the idea of ranking these things," Minino said in a telephone interview.

Stroke moved a down a notch, falling 3.8 percent between 2007 to 2008.

It was supplanted by deaths from chronic lower respiratory diseases such as asthma, emphysema and bronchitis, which surged 7.8 percent in 2008, although the increase may be due partly to a change in the way the CDC counts those deaths.

Heart disease and cancer remain the top two killers, accounting for 48 percent of all U.S. deaths in 2008.

The gap in life expectancy between blacks and whites in the United States closed a bit during the period, falling to 4.6 in 2008, down 0.2 years as life expectancy for black men reached an all-time high of 70.2 years.

There was no change in life expectancy for black women at 76.8 years.

Other details from the report include:

* Death rates fell for six of the 15 top causes of death: heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes, homicide and accidents.

* Deaths from Alzheimer's, flu and pneumonia, high blood pressure, suicide and kidney disease all rose in 2008.

* Infant mortality fell 2.4 percent in 2008 to an all-time low of 6.59 infant deaths per 1,000 live births. Birth defects were the chief cause of infant death in 2008, followed by problems related to premature birth and low birthweight.

Sudden infant death syndrome, or SIDS, was the third-leading cause of infant death in the United States.

The preliminary statistics are based on records of nearly all deaths that occurred in calendar year 2008.

(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen; Editing by Peter Cooney)