Why Do Women Have Longer Lives 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 main reason women live longer than men? Why has this advantage gotten larger as time passes? We only have a few clues and the evidence isn't sufficient to draw an informed conclusion. We know that biological, behavioral and environmental factors all play a role in the fact that women are healthier than men; However, we're not sure how significant the impact of each of these factors is.

In spite of the precise amount of weight, we are aware that at least a portion of the reason why women live so much longer than men in the present but not in the past, is to have to do with the fact that some fundamental non-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. 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. It is clear that every country is over the line of parity diagonally. This means that a newborn girl from every country could expect to live longer than her older brother.

This chart illustrates that, although women have an advantage in all countries, ابر التخسيس the differences across countries can be substantial. In Russia women have a longer life span than men. In Bhutan the gap is less than half one year.

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In the richer countries, the female advantage in longevity used to be smaller
Let's see how the female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The next chart shows male and female life expectancy when they were born in the US during the time period between 1790 and 2014. Two points stand out.

There is an upward trend. Men and women in America live 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 advantage of women in life expectancy was once quite small It has significantly increased in the past.

When you click on the option "Change country in the chart, you will be able to verify that these two points are applicable to the other countries having available data: Sweden, France and the UK.