Why Women Are More Likely To 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 so longer than men in the present, and why is this difference growing in the past? We only have partial evidence and the evidence is not strong enough to make an informed conclusion. We know that biological, behavioral and environmental factors play a role in the fact that women have longer life spans than men, but we don't know exactly how strong the relative contribution of each factor is.

It is known that women are living longer than men, افضل كريم للشعر regardless of weight. But it is not because of certain biological factors have changed. What are these new factors? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. There are others that are more intricate. For افضل كريم للشعر 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. It is clear that all countries are above the line of parity diagonally. This implies that a baby girl from any country can expect to live longer than her older brother.

This chart is interesting in that it shows that although the female advantage exists across all countries, the difference between countries is huge. In Russia women live 10 years longer than men; in Bhutan the gap is just half each year.

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The advantage women had in life expectancy was much lower in developed countries than it is today.
Let's see how the female longevity advantage has changed over time. The next chart plots the male and female lifespans at birth in the US between 1790 and 2014. Two points stand out.

The first is that there is an upward trend: Men and women in the US live 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 widening: While the female advantage in life expectancy used to be tiny It has significantly increased over time.

You can verify that these points are also applicable to other countries that have information by clicking on the "Change country" option in the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.