Difference between revisions of "Why Do Women Have Longer Lives Than Men"

Revision as of 00:10, 13 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. Why do women live so longer than men in the present and how is this difference growing in the past? We only have a few clues and the evidence isn't sufficient to draw an informed conclusion. We know that behavioral, biological and environmental factors all play a role in the fact that women live longer than men; however, we do not know how significant the impact of each one of these factors is.

We are aware that women are living longer than men, تحاميل مهبلية regardless of their weight. But, this is not because of certain biological or non-biological factors have changed. These variables are evolving. 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. As you can see, every country is above the diagonal parity line - which means that in every country the newborn girl is likely to live for longer than a newborn boy.1

This chart illustrates that, although there is a women's advantage throughout the world, the differences between countries can be substantial. In Russia, women live 10 years longer than males. In Bhutan the gap is just half a year.

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In wealthy countries, the advantage of women in longevity was not as great.
Let's see how the female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The following chart shows the men and women's life expectancies when they were born in the US between 1790-2014. Two aspects stand out.

There is an upward trend. Men and women in the United States live longer than they used to a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

There is a widening gap: The female advantage in terms of life expectancy used to be very small however, it has increased significantly over the last century.

By selecting 'Change Country from the chart, you will be able to verify that these two points are also applicable to other countries that have available data: Sweden, تحاميل مهبلية France and the UK.