Difference between revisions of "Why Do Women Live Longer Than Men"

Revision as of 09:05, 12 January 2022

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 are more likely to live longer than men? What is the reason has this advantage gotten larger over time? We have only a small amount of evidence and the evidence isn't sufficient to reach a definitive conclusion. We know there are biological, psychological and environmental factors which play a significant role in women living longer than men, we don't know how much each factor contributes.

In spite of the precise number of pounds, we know that at a minimum, the reason why women live longer than men do today and not in the past, is to be due to the fact that certain significant non-biological elements have changed. What are these factors that have changed? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Others 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. It is clear that every country is over the diagonal line of parity. This means that a newborn girl in every country can expect to live longer than her brothers.

Interestingly, this chart shows that the advantage of women is present everywhere, country-specific differences are huge. In Russia, women live 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan the difference is just half a year.

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In countries with high incomes, the women's advantage in longevity was not as great.
We will now examine how the female advantage in longevity has changed with time. The chart below shows gender-based and female-specific life expectancy at birth in the US between 1790 until 2014. Two distinct features stand out.

The first is that there is an upward trend. Men and women living in America are living longer than they used to a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

The gap is growing: Although the female advantage in life expectancy used to be extremely small It has significantly increased over time.

You can confirm that these points are also applicable to other countries with information by clicking on the "Change country" option on the chart. This includes the UK, ماذا يحدث بين الزوجين في الحمام بالصور France, and Sweden.