Why Do Women Live Longer Than Men

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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 so longer than men, and افضل كريم للشعر why has this advantage increased in the past? We only have a few clues and the evidence isn't strong enough to make an absolute conclusion. We know that behavioral, biological and environmental factors all contribute to the fact that women have longer lives than men, but we don't know exactly what the contribution of each one of these factors is.

It is known that women are living longer than men, regardless of their weight. But, 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. 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 above the diagonal line of parity. This means that a newborn girl in every country can expect to live longer than her older brother.

Interestingly, this chart shows that, while the advantage for women exists everywhere, the difference between countries is huge. In Russia women live 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan there is a difference of only half a year.

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In rich countries the advantage of women in longevity used to be smaller
Let's examine the way that female advantages in terms of longevity has changed over time. The chart below shows male and female life expectancy at birth in the US during the period 1790 to 2014. Two points stand out.

The first is that there is an upward trend. Men and women in America live longer than they were 100 years ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

There is an increase in the gap between men and women: female advantage in life expectancy used to be very small however, it has increased significantly during the last century.

It is possible to verify that these points are also applicable to other countries that have data by clicking the "Change country" option on the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.