Bill Harvey: Living is easy with eyes closed

It seems that the trend towards ever longer lives in developed countries has started to falter.

Official figures published last week have shown that life expectancy in the UK has fallen by more than a year since 2011. The reversal has already been noted in the US, in no small part related to their major problems with opioid painkillers such as fentanyl. In the UK, the trend seems to be much more closely linked with socioeconomic factors, with people in post-industrial towns and isolated rural areas dying younger while longevity is rising in London and parts of the south-east.

Why is this of interest? Eye diseases go hand in hand with longer life, and age is the main risk factor for most visually disabling disease. A cynic might point out that lower life expectancy might be reflected in reduced numbers of visually impaired.