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 live longer than men? And why has this advantage gotten larger as time passes? We have only a small amount of evidence and the evidence isn’t sufficient to reach an absolute conclusion. While we are aware that there are biological, Www.freakyexhibits.net/index.php/Why_Are_Women_Living_Longer_Than_Men behavioral, and environmental factors which all play a part in the longevity of women over males, it isn’t clear how much each one contributes.
In spite of the precise amount of weight, we are aware that a large portion of the reason why women live so much longer than men in the present however not as previously, has to be due to the fact that certain significant non-biological elements have changed. These variables are evolving. Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Others 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. We can see that all countries are above the diagonal parity line ; which means that in every country baby girls can expect to live longer than a new boy.1
The chart above shows that although the female advantage exists across all countries, the global differences are significant. In Russia women have an average of 10 years more than men. In Bhutan the difference is just half one year.
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In rich countries the advantage of women in longevity was not as great.
Let’s see how the female longevity advantage has changed over time. The next chart compares male and female life expectancies when they were born in the US over the period 1790-2014. Two things stand out.
The first is that there is an upward trend. Men and women in America have longer lives than they were a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.
And second, there is a widening gap: The female advantage in life expectancy used be very small however, it has increased significantly during the last century.
By selecting ‘Change Country in the chart, check that these two points are also applicable to the other countries with available information: Sweden, France and the UK.