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's the reason why women live longer than men? And how is this difference growing in the past? There isn't much evidence and we're only able to provide some answers. Although we know that there are biological, behavioral and environmental variables that all play a role in the longevity of women over men, we don't know how much each one contributes.

We are aware that women live longer than men, regardless of weight. But this isn't 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. 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 every country is over the line of parity diagonally. This implies that a baby girl in every country can be expected to live for longer than her brother.

This chart shows that, صبغ الشعر بالاسود although women have an advantage in all countries, the differences across countries can be substantial. In Russia women live 10 years more than men. In Bhutan there is a difference of less than half a calendar year.

__S.17__
__S.19__
The advantage women had in life expectancy was much lower in the richer countries as compared to the present.
Let's take a look at how the female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The following chart shows the male and female life expectancies at the birth in the US in the years 1790 to 2014. Two points stand out.

There is an upward trend: Men as well as 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.

Second, the gap is increasing: While the advantage of women in terms of life expectancy was quite small It has significantly increased over time.

Using the option 'Change country in the chart, check that these two points also apply to other countries that have available information: Sweden, France and the UK.