Why Do 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. What is the reason women live longer than men and how has this advantage increased in the past? We have only a small amount of evidence and the evidence is not sufficient to draw an informed conclusion. We recognize that biological, behavioral and environmental factors contribute to the fact that women are healthier than men; However, we're not sure what the contribution of each factor is.

In spite of the amount of weight, we are aware that at least part of the reason women live longer than men in the present and not previously, is to do with the fact that some fundamental non-biological factors have changed. What are these new factors? Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Others 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 every country is over the line of parity diagonally. This implies that a baby girl from any country can be expected to live for longer than her brothers.

The chart below shows that even though women enjoy an advantage everywhere, cross-country differences can be significant. In Russia women live 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan the difference is less than half each year.

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The advantage for women in life expectancy was less in the richer countries than it is today.
Let's examine the way that female advantages in longevity has changed with time. The next chart shows male and female life expectancies when they were born in the US during the time period between 1790 and 2014. Two aspects stand out.

First, صبغ الشعر بالاسود 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.

The gap is widening: While the advantage of women in terms of life expectancy was quite small, صبغ الشعر بالاسود it has increased substantially over time.

If you select the option "Change country from the chart, you can check that these two points are also applicable to the other countries having available data: Sweden, France and the UK.