Everywhere in the world women live longer than men – but this was not always the case. The available data from rich countries shows that women didn’t live longer than men in the 19th century. What is the reason women have a longer life span than men? And why the advantage has grown as time passes? There is only limited evidence and the evidence is not sufficient to draw an informed conclusion. We know there are behavioral, biological and environmental factors that all play a role in the longevity of women over men, we do not know how much each one contributes.
In spite of the amount of weight, we are aware that at least part of the reason why women live so much longer than men in the present however not as previously, is to relate to the fact that a number of significant non-biological elements have changed. These factors are changing. Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Some are more complex. For example, there is evidence that in rich countries the female advantage increased in part because infectious diseases used to affect women disproportionately a century ago, so advances in medicine that reduced the long-term health burden from infectious diseases, especially for survivors, ended up raising women’s longevity disproportionately.
Everywhere in the world women tend to live longer than men
The first chart below shows life expectancy at birth for men and women. We can see that every country is above the diagonal line of parity. This implies that a baby girl from every country could expect to live longer than her younger brother.
The chart above shows that, while the advantage for women exists everywhere, the global differences are significant. In Russia, women live 10 years more than men. In Bhutan there is a difference of only half a year.
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The advantage women had in life expectancy was much lower in countries with higher incomes that it is today.
We will now examine how the female advantage in terms of longevity has changed over time. The chart below shows male and female life expectancy at the time of birth in the US in the years 1790-2014. Two areas stand out.
First, there is an upward trend. Men as well as women in the US live a lot, much longer today than a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.
Second, the gap is increasing: While the advantage of women in life expectancy was extremely small however, it has grown significantly over time.
You can check if these are applicable to other countries with data by selecting the “Change country” option in the chart. This includes the UK, France, اوضاع الجماع and Sweden.
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Heriberto Hamel created the group
Why are women living longer than men? 4 years ago