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

Revision as of 05:29, 14 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 live longer than men in the present and how has this advantage increased in the past? There isn't much evidence and we're left with only incomplete solutions. We know there are biological, behavioral and environmental variables that play an integral role in women living longer than men, we do not know how much each factor contributes.

We have learned that women are living longer than males, regardless of weight. But, this is not due to the fact that certain biological factors have changed. What are the factors that are changing? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Other 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. We can see that all countries are above the diagonal parity line - this means that in all countries baby girls can expect to live longer than a new boy.1

It is interesting to note that the advantage of women exists in all countries, العاب زوجية global differences are significant. In Russia women are 10 years older than males; while in Bhutan the gap is less than half one year.

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In wealthy countries, the advantage of women in longevity was previously smaller.
Let's take a look at how the female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The chart below shows male and female life expectancies when they were born in the US during the period 1790 to 2014. Two distinct points stand out.

First, there's an upward trend. Men and women in the US live much, much longer today than a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

The second is that there is a widening gap: The female advantage in terms of life expectancy used be very small but it increased substantially during the last century.

By selecting 'Change Country from the chart, العاب زوجية check that these two points apply to the other countries with available data: Sweden, France and the UK.