New studies by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show American’s life expectancy has dropped for such a developed country. To see how the United States measures up in terms of life expectancy with those of a dozen countries that have similar economies, (the United Kingdom, Japan, Germany and other European countries) researchers at the CDC compared 2012 death rates across the countries. Their results found that American citizens live about two years less than citizens of these other countries. American citizens have a life expectancy of 76.4 years for men, and 81.2 years for women, compared with the 78.6 years for men and 83.4 years for women of citizens of these similar countries. The largest gaps are between people aged 25 and 65 (middle aged) and infants, who are also have also been known to face higher death rates. These gaps can be blamed on drug poisonings, gun injuries and motor vehicle crashes. Two years may not sound extremely significant, but the real concern is over America’s steady decrease in life expectancy, as the U.S.  used to lead these countries in life expectancy and has been decreasing in rank slowly since the 1980’s.