Dying isn't what it used to be

The Chicago Tribune reports that the number of Americans who died in 2004 dropped dramatically:

The preliminary number of U.S. deaths recorded for 2004 was 2,398,343. That represents a decline of 49,945 from the 2,448,288 recorded in 2003.

U.S. deaths ordinarily rise slightly each year. The last decline in annual deaths occurred in 1997, a modest drop of 445 deaths from 1996, Minino said.

The number of deaths has not dropped this steeply since 1938, when there were about 69,000 fewer than in 1937. A drop in 1944 came close -- about 48,000 fewer deaths than the previous year. Health officials could not immediately say why the number of deaths fell so sharply in either of those years.

"These are preliminary data," said Paul Terry, an assistant professor of epidemiology at Atlanta's Emory University. "But if it holds up, it's obviously very good news."

To see such a giant drop after years of annual increases was a little hard to swallow for some.

"We will not make much of this until the final data come out," said Elizabeth Ward, director of surveillance research for the American Cancer Society.

Check the voter rolls. Three of those years were federal election years. I wonder what was on the ballots in the off-year elections of 1997.