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Upper East Siders Live Longest as Overall NYC Life Expectancy Drops: Data

By Nicholas Rizzi | May 19, 2017 2:46pm | Updated on May 22, 2017 7:08am
 The overall life expectancy for New Yorkers decreased slight from 2014 to 2015, a study by the city's Department of Health found.
The overall life expectancy for New Yorkers decreased slight from 2014 to 2015, a study by the city's Department of Health found.
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Department of Health

NEW YORK CITY — New Yorkers' life expectancy is getting slightly shorter, but Upper East Side and Murray Hill residents can still plan on outlive their neighbors in other parts of the city, according to a study released Friday by the Department of Health.

Residents in those two neighborhoods had the highest life expectancy in the city, 85.9 years, as the overall expectancy decreased in 2015, the most recent data available.

The neighborhood with the lowest life expectancy in 2015 was Brownsville with an average of 75.1 years, according to the report.

Citywide, residents can be expected to live 81.2 years, a slight .1-year decrease from 2014, the study found. While life expectancy continues to rise for white residents — from 81.2 to 81.3 — it decreased by 0.2 years for Hispanic and black New Yorkers, according to the study.

Black residents still have the lowest rate of life expectancy in the city, at 77.3 years, and the gaps between low-poverty and high-poverty areas increased by 2.2 times in 2015, the study found.

"The annual Summary of Vital Statistics, the Health Department’s oldest continuously published document outlining the health of New Yorkers, tells us that we have more work to do in closing gaps in health disparities that exist in populations and neighborhoods across the city," Health Commissioner Dr. Mary Bassett said in a statement.

The leading cause of premature deaths were cancer, heart diseases and drug use, the study found.

The infant mortality rate also slightly increased citywide, with 4.3 infant death per 1,000 births in 2015 compared to 4.2 in 2014.

Compared to white residents, the infant mortality rate was three times higher for black New Yorkers and 2.3 higher for Puerto Rican New Yorkers, the study found.

Despite the slight dips in 2015, New Yorkers are still expected to live 1 1/2 longer than they did in 2006, according to the study.