Why Women Are More Likely To 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 women are more likely to live longer than men? What is the reason the advantage has grown over time? The evidence is limited and we only have partial solutions. While we are aware that there are biological, behavioral and environmental factors that play an integral role in the longevity of women over men, we don't know how much each factor contributes.

In spite of how much amount, we can say that at a minimum, the reason why women live so much longer than men in the present, but not previously, has to do with the fact that a number of significant non-biological elements have changed. These factors are changing. Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Others 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, تحاميل مهبلية 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 all countries are above the diagonal line of parity. This implies that a baby girl from any country can expect to live longer than her younger brother.

This chart illustrates that, while there is a female advantage throughout the world, the differences between countries can be substantial. In Russia women have a longer life span than men; in Bhutan the difference is just half one year.

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The advantage women had in life expectancy was less in developed countries as compared to the present.
We will now examine how the advantage of women in longevity has changed over time. The following chart shows the male and female life expectancies at birth in the US between 1790 to 2014. Two points stand out.

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

And second, تحاميل مهبلية there is an ever-widening gap: female advantage in terms of life expectancy used be quite small but it increased substantially over the course of the last century.

You can confirm that these principles are also applicable to other countries that have data by clicking the "Change country" option in the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.