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 why has this advantage increased over time? There isn’t much evidence and we have only incomplete answers. Although we know that there are biological, behavioral as well as environmental factors that play an integral role in women’s longevity more than males, it isn’t clear the extent to which each factor plays a role.
In spite of the precise weight, we know that a large portion of the reason women live so much longer than men do today however not as previously, has to have to do with the fact that a number of key non-biological factors have changed. What are these factors that have changed? Some are well known and علامات الحمل بولد 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 that a baby girl can be expected to live for longer than a newborn boy.1
This chart shows that, although women have an advantage throughout the world, the differences between countries are often significant. In Russia women have a longer life span than men. In Bhutan the gap is less than half an hour.
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In rich countries the female advantage in longevity was not as great.
Let’s now look at the way that female advantages in longevity has changed over time. The chart below illustrates the gender-based and female-specific life expectancy at the time of birth in the US between 1790-2014. Two points stand out.
There is an upward trend. Both genders living in America are living longer than they did 100 years ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.
Second, the gap is growing: Although the advantage of women in life expectancy used to be quite small It has significantly increased over time.
You can confirm that these principles are also applicable to other countries that have data by clicking the «Change country» option in the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.