Not exactly true. Life expectancy hasn't slipped, although admittedly it hasn't been increasing very fast in the last couple of years (up only 1 year over the l

Not exactly true. Life expectancy hasn't slipped, although admittedly it hasn't been increasing very fast in the last couple of years (up only 1 year over the last decade). http://hdr.undp.org/en/indicators/69206 http://hdr.undp.org/en/indicators/69206 Either way, you shouldn't look too much at short term trends when trying to measure long term development. If you start from 1990, life expectancy has actually risen by 4 years.