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 makes women live much longer than men today and why has this advantage increased in the past? We have only a small amount of evidence and the evidence isn’t strong enough to make an unambiguous conclusion. We know there are biological, behavioral and environmental factors that all play a role in women’s longevity more than males, we aren’t sure how much each factor contributes.
We have learned that women are living longer than men, regardless of their weight. However this is not because of certain non-biological factors have changed. These factors are changing. Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Certain are more complicated. 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. As you can see, all countries are above the diagonal parity line – which means that in every country a newborn girl can expect to live for longer than a newborn boy.1
This chart shows that, even though women enjoy an advantage throughout the world, the differences between countries can be significant. In Russia women live for 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan the gap is less than half a calendar year.
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In rich countries the advantage of women in longevity was smaller
Let’s examine how the gender advantage in terms of longevity has changed over time. The chart below illustrates the gender-based and female-specific life expectancy at the birth in the US between 1790 until 2014. Two things stand out.
There is an upward trend. Men and women in the US have a much longer life span 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: ماذا يحدث بين الزوجين في الحمام بالصور While the advantage of women in terms of life expectancy was quite small however, it has grown significantly over time.
By selecting ‘Change Country from the chart, you will be able to determine if these two points also apply to the other countries with available information: Sweden, France and the UK.
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Why women are more likely to live longer than men? 4 years ago