Why Are Women Living 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 have a longer life span than men? What is the reason is this difference growing over time? We have only a small amount of evidence and the evidence is not sufficient to draw a definitive conclusion. We know there are biological, behavioral and environmental factors which play a significant role in the longevity of women over men, we do not know how much each one contributes.

It is known that women are living longer than men, regardless of weight. However, this is not because of certain biological or non-biological factors have changed. What are these new factors? Some are well known and افضل شامبو وبلسم (Highly recommended Resource site) relatively straightforward, افضل شامبو وبلسم 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. As you can see, all countries are above the diagonal line of parity - which means that in every country the newborn girl is likely to live longer than a newborn boy.1

The chart below shows that while there is a female advantage everywhere, cross-country differences can be significant. In Russia women have a longer life span than males; while in Bhutan the difference is just half one year.

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In rich countries the female advantage in longevity used to be smaller
Let's examine how the advantage of women in terms of longevity has changed over time. The chart below shows men and women's life expectancies at the time of birth in the US in the years 1790 to 2014. Two specific points stand out.

There is an upward trend. Both men as well as women in the US have a much longer life span longer than they did 100 years ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

There is a widening gap: The female advantage in life expectancy used be extremely small however, it has increased significantly during the last century.

By selecting 'Change Country' on the chart, you can verify that these two points are applicable to other countries that have available data: Sweden, France and the UK.