Why 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. Why do women live longer than men and why does this benefit increase in the past? The evidence isn't conclusive and we only have limited answers. Although we know that there are behavioral, biological and environmental factors which play a significant role in the longevity of women over males, we aren't sure what percentage each factor plays in.

We have learned that women are living longer than men, regardless of weight. However this is not because of certain biological factors have changed. What are these new factors? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Some 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, 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 above the line of parity diagonally. This means that a newborn girl from every country could anticipate to live longer than her older brother.

Interestingly, this chart shows that, while the advantage for women is present everywhere, global differences are significant. In Russia, women live 10 years longer than males. In Bhutan the difference is less that half a year.

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In rich countries the longevity advantage for women was smaller
We will now 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 birth in the US from 1790 to 2014. Two things stand out.

First, there's an upward trend. Both men as well as women in the US are living much, much longer today than a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

Second, علامات الحمل بولد the gap is increasing: While the female advantage in life expectancy was once extremely small but it has risen significantly over time.

If you select the option "Change country from the chart, you will be able to verify that these two points apply to the other countries with available data: Sweden, France and the UK.