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. What makes women live longer than men in the present, and why is this difference growing over time? The evidence isn't conclusive and we only have some answers. We recognize that biological, behavioral and environmental factors contribute to the fact that women live longer than men; However, we're not sure how much the influence of each factor is.

We know that women are living longer than males, regardless of weight. But this is not because of certain biological factors have changed. These 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. We can see that every country is above the diagonal line of parity - this means in all countries that a baby girl can be expected to live longer than a new boy.1

This chart shows that, while there is a female advantage throughout the world, علامات الحمل بولد the differences between countries are often significant. In Russia women are 10 years older than men, while in Bhutan the gap is just half an hour.

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In the richer countries, the advantage of women in longevity was not as great.
Let's look at the way that female advantages in longevity has changed over time. The following chart shows the male and female life expectancies at birth in the US during the period 1790 to 2014. Two distinct points stand out.

First, there's an upward trend. and women in the US have a much longer life span longer today than a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

Second, the gap is widening: While the female advantage in terms of life expectancy was very small but it has risen significantly over time.

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