But it's deaths in younger age groups -- particularly middle-aged people -- that have had the largest impact on calculations of life expectancy, experts said.
The suicide death rate last year was the highest it's been in at least 50 years, according to U.S. government records.
For decades, U.S. life expectancy was on the upswing, rising a few months nearly every year.
Aside from that, "we've never really seen anything like this," said Robert Anderson, who oversees CDC death statistics.
This week, CDC officials said they had revised their life expectancy estimate for 2016 after some additional data came in.).
Drug overdose deaths also continued to climb, surpassing 70,000 last year, in the midst of the deadliest drug overdose epidemic in U.S. history.
But earlier CDC reports noted increase rates of suicide by gun and by suffocation or hanging. »
