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. Why do women live much longer than men today and how has this advantage increased over time? There isn't much evidence and we're left with only some answers. Although we know that there are biological, behavioral and environmental variables which play a significant role in women's longevity more than men, we do not know how much each one contributes.

In spite of how much weight, we know that at a minimum, the reason women live so much longer than men in the present but not previously, has to have to do with the fact that certain significant non-biological elements have changed. What are these changing factors? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Some are more complex. 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 the newborn girl is likely to live longer than a new boy.1

This chart shows that, although there is a women's advantage in all countries, the differences across countries are often significant. In Russia women live 10 years longer than men, while in Bhutan the gap is less than half one year.

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In rich countries the female advantage in longevity was smaller
Let's look at how female longevity advantage has changed over time. The following chart shows the male and female lifespans at birth in the US from 1790 to 2014. Two things stand out.

There is an upward trend. Men and women in the US live a lot, much longer today than a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

There is an ever-widening gap: افضل كريم للشعر female advantage in life expectancy used be extremely small but it increased substantially over the course of the last century.

It is possible to verify that the points you've listed are applicable to other countries with data by clicking the "Change country" option on the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.