Why Do Women Have Longer Lives Than Men

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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 have a longer life span than men? What is the reason has this advantage gotten larger in the past? The evidence is limited and we only have limited answers. We know that biological, behavioral and environmental factors all play a role in the fact that women have longer life spans than men, however, صبغ الشعر بالاسود, our source, we aren't sure how strong the relative contribution of each one of these factors is.

In spite of how much amount of weight, we are aware that at a minimum, the reason women live longer than men however not as in the past, is to be due to the fact that several key non-biological factors have changed. These factors are changing. 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, while there is a female advantage throughout the world, the differences between countries can be substantial. In Russia women have an average of 10 years more than men. In Bhutan the difference is less than half an hour.

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In countries with high incomes, the women's advantage in longevity was not as great.
We will now examine how the advantage of women in longevity has changed over time. The next chart compares the life expectancy of males and females at birth in the US during the time period between 1790 and 2014. Two distinct points stand out.

The first is that there is an upward trend. Men and صبغ الشعر بالاسود women in the US are living much, much longer today than a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

The gap is growing: Although the female advantage in terms of life expectancy was quite small It has significantly increased with time.

By selecting 'Change Country from the chart, you will be able to determine if these two points are applicable to the other countries having available information: Sweden, France and the UK.