Why are women living 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 much longer than men today, and why does this benefit increase in the past? The evidence is sketchy and we’re left with only partial answers. While we are aware that there are biological, behavioral as well as environmental factors that play an integral role in women who live longer than males, we aren’t sure the extent to which each factor plays a role.

In spite of how much amount of weight, we are aware that at least a portion of the reason why women live so much longer than men in the present however not as previously, has to have to do with the fact that certain key non-biological factors have changed. What are these changing factors? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, اوضاع الجماع (https://www.naijagobeta.com/community/profile/edythepaten787/) 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.

4 months agoEverywhere 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 all countries can expect to live longer than her brother.

This chart is interesting in that it shows that the advantage of women exists in all countries, cross-country differences are large. In Russia women live 10 years longer than males. In Bhutan the difference is less that half a year.

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The female advantage in life expectancy was smaller in rich countries as compared to the present.

Let’s see how the female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The chart below illustrates the gender-based and female-specific life expectancy at the birth in the US from 1790-2014. Two specific points stand out.

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

Second, the gap is increasing: While the female advantage in life expectancy was once quite small however, it has grown significantly over time.

You can check if these are applicable to other countries that have data by clicking on the “Change country” option in the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.

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