Why Do Women Live Longer Than Men

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 longer than men in the present, and why has this advantage increased in the past? We only have a few clues and تحاميل مهبلية the evidence is not sufficient to support a definitive conclusion. We recognize that biological, behavioral and environmental factors contribute to the fact that women have longer life spans than men, However, we're not sure what the contribution of each one of these factors is.

In spite of the weight, تحاميل مهبلية we know that a large portion of the reason why women live longer than men today, but not previously, has to be due to the fact that a number of important non-biological aspects have changed. These variables are evolving. Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. There are other issues that are more intricate. 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 over the line of parity diagonally. This means that a newborn girl in all countries can expect to live longer than her older brother.

This chart illustrates that, although women have an advantage across all countries, differences between countries could be significant. In Russia women live 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan, the difference is less than half a calendar year.

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The advantage for women in life expectancy was less in the richer countries as compared to the present.
Let's now look at how the female advantage in longevity has changed over time. The following chart shows the life expectancy of males and females at birth in the US from 1790 to 2014. Two points stand out.

There is an upward trend. Men and women in America live longer than they were 100 years ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

The gap is widening: While the advantage of women in life expectancy was tiny It has significantly increased over time.

By selecting 'Change Country from the chart, you can verify that these two points also apply to other countries with available information: Sweden, France and the UK.