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{{short description|Measure of average lifespan in a given population}}
{{otheruses4|the measure of remaining life|the ] novel|Life Expectancy (novel)}}
{{Mergefrom|Life Expectancy Index|Talk:Life Expectancy Index#Merger proposal|date=August 2008}} {{About|normal lifespan|the novel|Life Expectancy (novel){{!}}''Life Expectancy'' (novel)}}
{{Redirect|Human lifespan|the lifespan of a person in stages|Developmental psychology{{!}}Maturation}}
{{Cleanup|reason=Clarification needed at times|date=November 2022}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2024}}
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]<ref name="who_2019">{{cite web|title=Life expectancy and Healthy life expectancy, data by country|language=en|publisher=World Health Organization|url=https://apps.who.int/gho/data/node.main.688|date=4 December 2020}}</ref>]]
]|format=XLSX|language=en}} – see file "Compact (most used: estimates and medium projections)"</ref>
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[[File:Life expectancy UN map gradient 2023 at age 15.png|thumb|300px|Life expectancy at age 15 years<ref name="un_prospects" />
'''Life expectancy''' is the average number of years of life remaining at a given age. Life expectancy is heavily dependent on the criteria used to select the group. In countries with high ] rates, the life expectancy at birth is highly sensitive to the rate of death in the first few years of life. In these cases, another measure such as life expectancy at age 5 (e<sub>5</sub>) can be used to exclude the effects of infant mortality to reveal the effects of causes of death other than early childhood causes.
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[[File:Life expectancy UN map gradient 2023 at age 65.png|thumb|300px|Life expectancy at age 65 years<ref name="un_prospects" />
==Humans==
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[[File:Life expectancy UN map gradient 2023 at age 80.png|thumb|300px|Life expectancy at age 80 years<ref name="un_prospects" />
Humans live on average 31.99 years in ] and on average 82 years in ] (2008 est.). The ] is 122 years, though some people are reported to have lived longer. Although there are several ], mostly in different stories that were spread in some cultures, there is no scientific evidence of a human living for hundreds of years. The following information is derived from the ''Encyclopaedia Britannica'', 1961, as well as other sources:
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'''Human life expectancy''' is a statistical measure of the estimate of the average remaining years of life at a given age. The most commonly used measure is ''life expectancy at birth'' (LEB, or in demographic notation ''e''<sub>0</sub>, where ''e''<sub>x</sub> denotes the average life remaining at age ''x''). This can be defined in two ways. ''Cohort'' LEB is the mean length of life of a birth ] (in this case, all individuals born in a given year) and can be computed only for cohorts born so long ago that all their members have died. ''Period'' LEB is the mean length of life of a ] cohort<ref>{{cite web|title="Life Expectancy" – What does this actually mean?|url=https://ourworldindata.org/life-expectancy-how-is-it-calculated-and-how-should-it-be-interpreted|access-date=2020-08-31|website=Our World in Data}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Period and cohort life expectancy explained: December 2019|work=Office for National Statistics|publisher=UK Government|url=https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/lifeexpectancies/methodologies/periodandcohortlifeexpectancyexplained|access-date=2020-08-31}}</ref> assumed to be exposed, from birth through death, to the ]s observed at a given year.<ref>{{cite book|vauthors=Shryock HS, Siegel JS|title=The Methods and Materials of Demography|edition=rev.|location=Washington, DC|publisher=Bureau of the Census, Government Printing Office|date=1973}}</ref> National LEB figures reported by national agencies and international organizations for human populations are estimates of ''period'' LEB.

Human remains from the early ] indicate an LEB of 24.<ref name="MacLennan_1999">{{cite journal|vauthors=MacLennan WJ, Sellers WI|title=Ageing through the ages|journal=Proceedings of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh|volume=29|issue=1|pages=71–5|date=January 1999|pmid=11623672|doi=10.1177/147827159902900114}}</ref> In 2019, world LEB was 73.3.<ref>{{cite web|publisher=World Health Organization|date=2023|title=Life expectancy at birth (years) |url=https://data.who.int/indicators/i/90E2E48|access-date=18 December 2023}}</ref> A combination of high ] and deaths in young adulthood from accidents, ]s, plagues, wars, and childbirth, before modern medicine was widely available, significantly lowers LEB. For example, a society with a LEB of 40 would have relatively few people dying at exactly 40: most will die before 30 or after 55. In populations with high infant mortality rates, LEB is highly sensitive to the rate of death in the first few years of life. Because of this sensitivity, LEB can be grossly misinterpreted, leading to the belief that a population with a low LEB would have a small proportion of older people.<ref name="Laden2011">{{cite news|vauthors=Laden G|url=http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2011/05/01/falsehood-if-this-was-the-ston/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121111192623/http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2011/05/01/falsehood-if-this-was-the-ston/|url-status=dead|archive-date=11 November 2012|title=Falsehood: "If this was the Stone Age, I'd be dead by now"|work=ScienceBlogs|date=2011-05-01|access-date=2014-08-31}}</ref> A different measure, such as life expectancy at age 5 (e<sub>5</sub>), can be used to exclude the effect of infant mortality to provide a simple measure of overall mortality rates other than in early childhood. For instance, in a society with a life expectancy of 30, it may nevertheless be common to have a 40-year remaining timespan at age 5 (but not a 60-year one{{dubious|date=September 2024}}).

Aggregate population measures—such as the proportion of the population in various age groups—are also used alongside individual-based measures—such as formal life expectancy—when analyzing population structure and dynamics. Pre-modern societies had universally higher mortality rates and lower life expectancies at every age for both males and females.

Life expectancy, ], and ] are not synonymous. Longevity refers to the relatively long lifespan of some members of a population. Maximum lifespan is the age at death for the longest-lived individual of a species. Mathematically, life expectancy is denoted <math>e_x</math> {{efn|name=exsymbol}} and is the mean number of years of life remaining at a given age <math>x</math>, with a particular ].<ref name="O'Sullivan_2003">{{cite book|vauthors=O'Sullivan A, Sheffrin SM|title=Economics: Principles in Action|publisher=Pearson Prentice Hall|year=2003|isbn=978-0-13-063085-8|page=473|author-link=Arthur O'Sullivan (economist)}}</ref> Because life expectancy is an average, a particular person may die many years before or after the expected survival.

Life expectancy is also used in plant or animal ],<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Contreras SC, Jurema AL, Claudino ES, Bresciani E, Caneppele TM|title=Monowave and polywave light-curing of bulk-fill resin composites: degree of conversion and marginal adaptation following thermomechanical aging|journal=Biomaterial Investigations in Dentistry|volume=8|issue=1|pages=72–78|year=1983|pmid=34368776|doi=10.2307/1937181|publisher=Ecological Society of America|bibcode=1983Ecol...64..631M|jstor=1937181|pmc=8317947}}</ref> and in ]s (also known as ] tables). The concept of life expectancy may also be used in the context of manufactured objects,<ref name="machine">{{cite book|vauthors=Zahavi E, Torbilo V|title=Fatigue Design: Life Expectancy of Machine Parts.|date=1996|publisher=CRC Press|location=Boca Raton|isbn=978-0-8493-8970-2}}</ref> though the related term{{dubious|reason=Is that very well related? Perhaps for perishable food, but for manufactured items that start wearing down during use, it is not an indication of the useful life (starting when put into service) and thus value of the item (as MTBF would be).|date=September 2022}} ] is commonly used for consumer products, and the terms "mean time to breakdown" and "]" are used in engineering.

== History ==

The earliest documented work on life expectancy was done in the 1660s by ],<ref>{{cite book|vauthors=Sutherland I|title=Encyclopedia of Biostatistics|date=15 July 2005|isbn=978-0-470-84907-1|pages=1–2|chapter=Graunt, John|doi=10.1002/0470011815.b2a17055}}</ref> ], and ].<ref name="Johnson_2021">{{cite book|vauthors=Johnson S|author-link=Steven Johnson (author)|title=Extra Life|publisher=]|year=2021|isbn=978-0-525-53885-1|edition=1st|pages=15}}</ref>

==Human patterns==
===Maximum===
] for any human is that of Frenchwoman ], who is verified as having lived to age 122 years, 164 days, between 21 February 1875 and 4 August 1997. This is referred to as the "]", which is the upper boundary of life, the maximum number of years any human is known to have lived.<ref name="Santrock">{{cite book|vauthors=Santrock J|date=2007|title=Life Expectancy. A Topical Approach to: Life-Span Development|pages=128–132|location=New York, New York|publisher=The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.|isbn=978-0-07-313376-8}}</ref> According to a study by biologists Bryan G. Hughes and Siegfried Hekimi, there is no evidence for limit on human lifespan.<ref>{{cite press release|date=28 June 2017|title=No detectable limit to how long people can live|url=https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/06/170628131500.htm|publisher=]|access-date=4 July 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Hughes BG, Hekimi S|title=Many possible maximum lifespan trajectories|journal=Nature|volume=546|issue=7660|pages=E8–E9|date=June 2017|pmid=28658230|doi=10.1038/nature22786|s2cid=4464500|bibcode=2017Natur.546E...8H}}</ref> However, this view has been questioned on the basis of error patterns.<ref name="Newman_2018">{{cite journal|vauthors=Newman SJ|title=Errors as a primary cause of late-life mortality deceleration and plateaus|journal=PLOS Biology|volume=16|issue=12|pages=e2006776|date=December 2018|pmid=30571676|pmc=6301557|doi=10.1371/journal.pbio.2006776|doi-access=free}}</ref> A theoretical study shows that the maximum life expectancy at birth is limited by the human life characteristic value δ, which is around 104 years.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Liu|first=Xiaoping|date=December 2015|title=Life equations for the senescence process|journal=Biochemistry and Biophysics Reports|language=en|volume=4|pages=228–233|doi=10.1016/j.bbrep.2015.09.020|pmc=5669524|pmid=29124208}}</ref>

===Variation over time===
{{further|Longevity|List of countries by past life expectancy}}
The following information is derived from the 1961 '']'' and other sources, some with questionable accuracy. Unless otherwise stated, it represents estimates of the life expectancies of the ] as a whole. In many instances, life expectancy varied considerably according to class and gender.


Life expectancy at birth takes account of ] and ] but not prenatal mortality.
{| class="wikitable"
{| class="wikitable sortable" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border: none; font-size:95%"
! Humans by Era !! Average Lifespan at Birth<br>(years) !! Comment
|- |-
! Era !! Life expectancy at birth in years !! Notes
| ] || align="center" | 33 || At age 15: 39 (to age 54)<ref name=kaplan>Hillard Kaplan, ect. al, in "A Theory of Human Life History Evolution: Diet, Intelligence,weed knowledge and Longevity" (Evolutionary Anthropology, 2000, p. 156-185, - http://www.soc.upenn.edu/courses/2003/spring/soc621_iliana/readings/kapl00d.pdf</ref><ref>Caspari & Lee 'Older age becomes common late in human evolution' (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA, 2004, p. 10895-10900</ref>
|- |-
|]||style="text-align:center;"|22–33<ref name="Kotre1997" />||With modern hunter-gatherer populations' estimated average life expectancy at birth of 33 years, life expectancy for the 60% reaching age 15 averages 39 remaining years.<ref name=kaplanetal2000>{{cite journal|year=2000|vauthors=Kaplan H, Hill K, Lancaster J, Hurtado AM|title=A Theory of Human Life History Evolution: Diet, Intelligence and Longevity|journal=Evolutionary Anthropology|volume=9|issue=4|pages=156–185|doi=10.1002/1520-6505(2000)9:4<156::AID-EVAN5>3.0.CO;2-7|s2cid=2363289|url=http://www.unm.edu/~hkaplan/KaplanHillLancasterHurtado_2000_LHEvolution.pdf|access-date=12 September 2010}}</ref>
| ] || align="center" | 20 || &nbsp;
|- |-
|]||style="text-align:center;"|20<ref name=Galor&Moav2007>{{cite web|year=2007|vauthors=Galor O, Moav O|url=http://www.brown.edu/academics/economics/sites/brown.edu.academics.economics/files/uploads/2007-14_paper.pdf|title=The Neolithic Revolution and Contemporary Variations in Life Expectancy|publisher=] Working Paper|access-date=12 September 2010}}</ref>–33<ref name=Lawrence1984>{{citation|year=1984|vauthors=Angel JL|title=Health as a crucial factor in the changes from hunting to developed farming in the eastern Mediterranean|journal=Proceedings of Meeting on Paleopathology at the Origins of Agriculture|pages=51–73}}</ref>||Based on Early Neolithic data, life expectancy at age 15 would be 28–33 years.<ref name="Angel_1969">{{cite journal|vauthors=Angel JL|title=The bases of paleodemography|journal=American Journal of Physical Anthropology|volume=30|issue=3|pages=427–437|date=May 1969|pmid=5791021|doi=10.1002/ajpa.1330300314}}</ref>
| ]<ref>James Trefil, "Can We Live Forever?" ''101 Things You Don't Know About Science and No One Else Does Either'' (1996)</ref> || align="center" | 18 || &nbsp;
|- |-
|] and ]<ref name="sticerd.lse.ac.uk">{{cite web|year=2005|vauthors=Galor O, Moav O|url=http://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/seminarpapers/dg09102006.pdf|title=Natural Selection and the Evolution of Life Expectancy|publisher=] Working Paper|access-date=4 November 2010}}</ref>||style="text-align:center;"|26||Based on Early and Middle Bronze Age data, life expectancy at age 15 would be 28–36 years.<ref name="Angel_1969"/>
| ]<ref></ref> || align="center" | 20-30 || &nbsp;
|- |-
|]<ref>{{cite journal|jstor=40752487|title=Economic Growth in Ancient Greece|vauthors=Morris I|journal=Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics|year=2004|volume=160|issue=4|pages=709–742|doi=10.1628/0932456042776050}}</ref>||style="text-align:center;"|25<ref>{{cite book|vauthors=Hansen MH|title=The shotgun method: the demography of the ancient Greek city-state culture.|publisher=University of Missouri Press|date=2006|page=55|isbn=978-0-8262-6548-7}}</ref>–28<ref name="britannica">{{cite encyclopedia|url=https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/393100/mortality|title=Mortality|encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica|access-date=4 November 2010}}</ref>||Based on Athens Agora and Corinth data, life expectancy at age 15 would be 37–41 years.<ref name="Angel_1969"/> Most Greeks and Romans died young. About half of all children died before adolescence. Those who survived to the age of 30 had a reasonable chance of reaching 50 or 60. The truly elderly, however, were rare. Because so many died in childhood, life expectancy at birth was probably between 20 and 30 years.<ref name="Ryan2021">{{cite book|vauthors=Ryan G|title=Naked Statues, Fat Gladiators, and War Elephants: Frequently Asked Questions about the Ancient Greeks and Romans|date=2021-09-01|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|isbn=978-1-63388-703-9|page=44|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sFkzEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA44}}</ref>
| ]<ref></ref><ref></ref> || align="center" | 20-30 || &nbsp;
|- |-
|]||style="text-align:center;"|20–33
| ]<ref></ref> || align="center" | 25-35 || &nbsp;
<ref name="Boatwright2021">
{{cite book|vauthors=Boatwright MT|title=Imperial Women of Rome: Power, Gender, Context|date=2021|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-045589-7|page=87|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=W78lEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA87}}
</ref><ref>
* {{cite book|vauthors=Scheidel W|title=Debating Roman Demography|date=2017|publisher=BRILL|isbn=978-90-04-35109-7|page=29|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EgD1DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA29|quote=25–30}}
* {{cite book|vauthors=Flower HI|title=The Cambridge Companion to the Roman Republic|date=2014|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-139-99238-1|page=105|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MzH6AwAAQBAJ&pg=PA105}}
* {{cite journal|vauthors=Scheidel W|author1-link=Walter Scheidel|title=Growing up fatherless in antiquity: the demographic background|journal=Princeton/Stanford Working Papers in Classics|date=2006|page=2|url=https://www.princeton.edu/~pswpc/pdfs/scheidel/060601.pdf}}
* {{cite book|vauthors=Wolf AP|title=Inbreeding, Incest, and the Incest Taboo: The State of Knowledge at the Turn of the Century|date=2005|publisher=Stanford University Press|isbn=978-0-8047-5141-4|page=97|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OW1nuQxcIQgC&pg=PA97}}
</ref><ref name="Saller1997"/><ref name="Ryan2021"/><ref name="Kotre1997"/><ref name="Carrieri2005">
{{cite journal|vauthors=Carrieri MP, Serraino D|title=Longevity of popes and artists between the 13th and the 19th century|journal=International Journal of Epidemiology|volume=34|issue=6|pages=1435–1436|date=December 2005|pmid=16260451|doi=10.1093/ije/dyi211|doi-access=free}}
</ref>
||Data is lacking, but computer models provide the estimate. If a person survived to age 20, they could expect to live around 30 years more. Life expectancy was probably slightly longer for women than men.<ref name=Frier2008>{{cite book|title=The Cambridge Ancient History XI: The High Empire, A.D. 70–192|vauthors=Frier B|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=2009|isbn=978-1-139-05439-3|pages=788–789|chapter=Chapter 27: Demographics}}</ref>
Life expectancy at age 1 reached 34–41 remaining years for the 67<ref name="Boatwright2021"/>–75% surviving the first year. For the 55-65% surviving to age 5, remaining life expectancy reached around 40–45,<ref name="Saller1997"/> while the ~50% reaching age 10 could expect another 40 years of life.<ref name="Boatwright2021"/> Average remaining years fell to 33–39 at age 15; ~20 at age 40;<ref name="Boatwright2021"/> 14–18 at age 50; ~10–12 at age 60; and ~6–7 at age 70.<ref name="Saller1997">{{cite book|vauthors=Saller RP|title=Patriarchy, Property and Death in the Roman Family|date=1997|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-59978-8|pages=22–25|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_VbZEvtcGbMC&pg=PA23}}</ref><ref name=Frier2008/>
|- |-
| Wang clan of China, 1st century AD – 1749|| style="text-align:center;" |35|| Life expectancy at age 1 reached 47 years for the 72% surviving the first year.<ref name="Maher2021"/><ref name="Bagchi2008">{{cite book|vauthors=Bagchi AK|title=Perilous Passage: Mankind and the Global Ascendancy of Capital|date=2008|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers|isbn=978-1-4617-0515-4|page=138|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xHsHEoYh3V0C&pg=PA138}}</ref>
| ]<ref>{{citation|title=The Western Medical Tradition|first=Lawrence I.|last=Conrad|publisher=]|year=2006|isbn=0521475643|page=137}}</ref> || align="center"| 35+ || The average lifespans of the ] class were 59&ndash;84.3 years in the ]<ref>{{citation|title=''Authority, Conflict, and the Transmission of Diversity in Medieval Islamic Law'' by R. Kevin Jaques|first=Ahmad Atif|last=Ahmad|journal=Journal of Islamic Studies|year=2007|volume=18=issue=2|pages=246-248 |doi=10.1093/jis/etm005}}</ref><ref>{{citation|title=The Age Structure of Medieval Islamic Education|first=Richard W.|last=Bulliet|journal=]|volume=57|year=1983|pages=105-117 }}</ref> and 69&ndash;75 in ].<ref>{{citation|last=Shatzmiller|first=Maya|year=1994|title=Labour in the Medieval Islamic World|page=66|publisher=]|isbn=9004098968}}</ref>
|- |-
|] (Europe, from the late 5th or early 6th century to the 10th century)|| style="text-align:center;" |30–35|| A Gaulish boy surviving to age 20 might expect to live 25 more years, while a woman at age 20 could normally expect about 17 more years. Anyone who survived until 40 had a good chance of another 15 to 20 years.<ref>{{cite book|vauthors=Bitel LM|title=Women in Early Medieval Europe, 400–1100|date=2002-10-24|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-59773-9|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XRudk_NcA7cC&pg=PA25}}</ref>
| ]<ref></ref><ref></ref> || align="center" | 20-30 || &nbsp;
|- |-
|]|| style="text-align:center;" |20–40||Expectation of life at birth 13–36 years for various Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures, most of the results lying in the range 24–32 years.<ref>{{cite web|vauthors=McCaa R|url=https://users.pop.umn.edu/~rmccaa/mxpoprev/cambridg3.htm|title=The Peopling of Mexico from Origins to Revolution}}</ref> Aztec life expectancy 41.2 years for men and 42.1 for women.<ref>{{cite book|vauthors=Mc Krause S|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kwCqDwAAQBAJ|title=Life in the Aztec Empire|publisher=Brainy Bookstore Mckrause}}</ref>
| ]<ref></ref><ref></ref> || align="center" | 30-40 || &nbsp;
|- |-
|]<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/H/history/guide12/part06.html|title=Time traveller's guide to Medieval Britain|publisher=Channel4.com|access-date=4 November 2010}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/241864.stm|title=A millennium of health improvement|publisher=BBC News|date=27 December 1998|access-date=4 November 2010}}</ref>||style="text-align:center;"|30–33<ref name="Carrieri2005"/>|| Around a third of infants died in their first year.<ref name="Kotre1997"/> Life expectancy at age 10 reached 32.2 remaining years, and for those who survived to 25, the remaining life expectancy was 23.3 years. Such estimates reflected the life expectancy of adult males from the higher ranks of English society in the Middle Ages, and were similar to that computed for monks of the Christ Church in Canterbury during the 15th century.<ref name="Carrieri2005"/> At age 21, life expectancy of an aristocrat was an additional 43 years.<ref name="Expectations of Life">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=T4DLK7zLxYMC&pg=PA8|title=Expectations of Life|vauthors=Lancaster HO|page=8|publisher=Springer Science & Business Media|date=1990|isbn=978-0-387-97105-6}}</ref>
| ]<ref></ref><ref>World Bank - http://www.worldbank.org/depweb/english/modules/social/life/index.html</ref> || align="center" | 66.12 (2008 est.) ||
|-
|] (16th – 18th century)<ref name="sticerd.lse.ac.uk"/> || style="text-align:center;" |33–40||18th-century male life expectancy at birth was 34 years.<ref name="pomeranz">{{citation|vauthors=Pomeranz K|title=The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy|page=37|year=2000|publisher=]|isbn=978-0-691-09010-8|author-link=Kenneth Pomeranz}}</ref> Female expectation of remaining years at age 15 rose from ~33 years around the 15th-16th centuries to ~42 in the 18th century.<ref name=Griffin2008>{{cite journal|vauthors=Griffin JP|title=Changing life expectancy throughout history|journal=Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine|volume=101|issue=12|pages=577|date=December 2008|pmid=19092024|pmc=2625386|doi=10.1258/jrsm.2008.08k037}} Note: Author is clearly using the term "life expectancy" to mean total years, as is evident from the fact that a life expectancy of 79.2 is given for a 15 year old girl in 1989.</ref>
|-
|18th-century ]<ref name="OurWorldInData"/><ref name="Kotre1997">{{cite book|vauthors=Kotre JN, Hall E|title=Seasons of Life: The Dramatic Journey from Birth to Death|date=1997|publisher=University of Michigan Press|isbn=978-0-472-08512-5|pages=47–49|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=b7hiKxl9jZ4C&pg=PA47}}</ref>||style="text-align:center;"|25–40|| For most of the century it ranged from 35 to 40; but in the 1720s it dipped as low as 25.<ref name="OurWorldInData"/> During the second half of the century it averaged 37,<ref name="Li2021"/> while for the elite it passed 40 and approached 50.<ref name="Maher2021">{{cite book|vauthors=Maher G|title=The Imperial Roman Economy|date=2021|publisher=Kilnamanagh|isbn=978-1-9996262-2-8|pages=123, 137, 123–151|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iqAlEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA123}}</ref>
|-
|Pre-Champlain ]<ref>{{cite book|title=Voices and Visions: A Story of Canada|vauthors=Francis D|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2006|isbn=978-0-19-542169-9|location=Canada|pages=21}}</ref>
|style="text-align:center;"|60
|] wrote that in his visits to ] and Huron communities, he met people over 100 years old. ] attributes the incredible lifespan in the region to low stress and a healthy diet of lean meats, diverse vegetables, and legumes.<ref>{{cite book|vauthors=Paul DN|author-link=Daniel N. Paul|title=We Were Not the Savages: A Micmac Perspective on the Collision of European and Aboriginal Civilizations|url=https://archive.org/details/wewerenotsavages0000paul_t1q7|url-access=registration|edition=1st|year=1993|publisher=Nimbus|isbn=978-1-55109-056-6}}</ref>
|-
|18th-century ]<ref name=pomeranz/>||style="text-align:center;"|24.7||For males.<ref name=pomeranz/>
|-
|18th-century ]<ref name=pomeranz/>||style="text-align:center;"|27.5–30||For males:<ref name=pomeranz/> 24.8 years in 1740–1749, 27.9 years in 1750–1759, 33.9 years in 1800–1809.<ref name="Bagchi2008"/>
|-
|18th-century American colonies<ref name="Kotre1997"/>||style="text-align:center;"|28||Massachusetts colonists who reached the age of 50 could expect to live until 71, and those who were still alive at 60 could expect to reach 75.
|-
|Beginning of the 19th century<ref name="OurWorldInData">{{cite journal|author1=Roser M|author1-link=Max Roser|author2=Ortiz-Ospina E|author3=Ritchie H|author3-link=Hannah Ritchie|title=Life Expectancy|url=https://ourworldindata.org/life-expectancy#how-did-life-expectancy-change-over-time|journal=Our World in Data|location=How did life expectancy change over time?|date=2019|orig-date=2013}}</ref>||style="text-align:center;"|~29|| At the beginning of the 19th century, no country in the world had a life expectancy at birth longer than 40 years, England, Belgium and the Netherlands came closest, each reaching 40 years by the 1840s (by which time they had been surpassed by Norway, Sweden and Denmark). India's life expectancy is estimated at ~25 years,<ref name="OurWorldInData"/> while Europe averaged ~33 years.<ref name="Li2021">{{cite book|vauthors=Li B|title=An Early Modern Economy in China|date=2021|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-108-47920-2|pages=246–247|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=h7H2DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA247}}</ref>
|-
|Early 19th-century ]<ref name="sticerd.lse.ac.uk"/><ref name="OurWorldInData"/><ref name="Maher2021"/>||style="text-align:center;"|40|| Remaining years of life averaged ~45<ref name="Maher2021" />–47 for the 84% who survived the first year. Life expectancy fell to ~40 years at age 20, then ~20 years at age 50 and ~10 years at age 70.<ref name="OurWorldInData"/> For a 15-year-old girl it was ~40–45.<ref name="Griffin2008"/> For the upper-class, LEB rose from ~45 to 50.<ref name="Maher2021"/>
Only half of the people born in the early 19th century made it past their 50th birthday. In contrast, 97% of the people born in 21st century England and Wales can expect to live longer than 50 years.<ref name="OurWorldInData"/>
|-
|19th-century ]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/life-expectancy?year=1810|title=Life expectancy|work=]|access-date=2018-08-28}}</ref>||style="text-align:center;"|25.4||
|-
|19th-century world average<ref name="OurWorldInData"/>||style="text-align:center;"|28.5–32|| Over the course of the century: Europe rose from ~33 to 43, the Americas from ~35 to 41, Oceania ~35 to 48, Asia ~28, Africa 26.<ref name="OurWorldInData"/> In 1820s France, LEB was ~38, and for the 80% that survived, it rose to ~47. For Moscow serfs, LEB was ~34, and for the 66% that survived, it rose to ~36.<ref name="Maher2021"/> Western Europe in 1830 was ~33 years, while for the people of Hau-Lou in China, it was ~40.<ref name="Li2021"/> The LEB for a 10-year-old in Sweden rose from ~44 to ~54.<ref name="OurWorldInData"/>
|-
|1900 world average<ref name="WHO Consultant 2006">{{cite web|url=https://www.who.int/global_health_histories/seminars/presentation07.pdf|title=Health, history and hard choices: Funding dilemmas in a fast-changing world|access-date=4 November 2010|vauthors=Prentice T|website=World Health Organization: Global Health Histories}}</ref>||style="text-align:center;"|31–32<ref name="OurWorldInData"/>|| Around 48 years in Oceania, 43 in Europe, and 41 in the Americas.<ref name="OurWorldInData"/> Around 47 in the U.S.<ref name="Kotre1997"/> and around 48 for 15-year-old girls in England.<ref name="Griffin2008"/>
|-
|1950 world average<ref name="WHO Consultant 2006"/>||style="text-align:center;"|45.7–48<ref name="OurWorldInData" />|| Around 60 years in Europe, North America, Oceania, Japan, and parts of South America; but only 41 in Asia and 36 in Africa. Norway led with 72, while in Mali it was merely 26.<ref name="OurWorldInData"/>
|-
|2019–2020 world average|| style="text-align:center;" |72.6–73.2 <br><ref name="OurWorldInData"/><ref>
72.6
* {{cite web|publisher=U.N. Department of Economic and Social Affairs|work=Population Division|title=World Population Prospects 2019|url=https://population.un.org/wpp/Publications/Files/WPP2019_Highlights.pdf}}
72.7
* {{cite web|url=http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN|title=Life expectancy at birth, total (years) – Data|website=data.worldbank.org}}
</ref><ref name=Worldometer>
{{cite web|title=Life Expectancy by Country and in the World|work=Worldometer|url=https://www.worldometers.info/demographics/life-expectancy/}}</ref> ||| {{plainlist|
* Females: 75.6 years
* Males: 70.8 years
* Range: ~54 (Central African Republic) – 85.3 (Hong Kong)<ref name="Worldometer" />
}}
|} |}
English life expectancy at birth averaged about 36 years in the 17th and 18th centuries, one of the highest levels in the world although infant and child mortality remained higher than in later periods. Life expectancy was under 25 years in the early ],<ref>{{cite web|title=Medicine & Health|url=http://www.stratfordhall.org/educational-resources/teacher-resources/medicine-health/|work=Stratfordhall.org|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200215062621/http://stratfordhall.org/educational-resources/teacher-resources/medicine-health/|archive-date=15 February 2020}}</ref> and in seventeenth-century New England, about 40% died before reaching adulthood.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/historyonline/usdeath.cfm|title=Death in Early America|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101230203658/http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/historyonline/usdeath.cfm|archive-date=30 December 2010|work=Digital History}}</ref> During the ], the life expectancy of children increased dramatically.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|url=https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/387301/modernization/12022/Population-change|title=Population Change Modernization|encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica|date=25 May 2024}}</ref> Recorded deaths among children under the age of 5 years fell in London from 74.5% of the recorded births in 1730–49 to 31.8% in 1810–29,<ref>{{cite book|vauthors=Buer MC|title=Health, Wealth and Population in the Early Days of the Industrial Revolution|location=London|publisher=George Routledge & Sons|date=1926|page=30|isbn=978-0-415-38218-2}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/victorians/foundling_01.shtml|publisher=BBC|title=History—The Foundling Hospital|date=1 May 2001}}</ref> though this overstates mortality and its fall because of net immigration (hence more dying in the metropolis than were born there) and incomplete registration (particularly of births, and especially in the earlier period). English life expectancy at birth reached 41 years in the 1840s, 43 in the 1870s and 46 in the 1890s, though infant mortality remained at around 150 per thousand throughout this period.


]]]
These represent estimates of the life expectancies of the ] as a whole. In many instances life expectancy varied considerably according to class and gender. Life expectancy rises sharply in all cases for those who reach puberty. All statistics include ], but not ] or ]. This table also rejects certain beliefs based on myths that the ancient humans had life expectancy of hundreds of years. The sharp drop in life expectancy with the advent of the ] mirrors the evidence{{Fact|date=January 2009}} that the advent of agriculture actually marked a sharp drop in life expectancy that humans are only recovering from in more recent times, mainly in affluent nations.


] measures are credited with much of the recent increase in life expectancy. During 20th century, the average lifespan in the United States increased by more than 30 years; 25 years of which can be attributed to advances in public health.<ref>{{cite journal |author=CDC |title= Ten great public health achievements—United States, 1900–1999 |journal= MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep |volume=48 |issue=12 |pages=241–3 |year=1999 |pmid=10220250 |url=http://cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00056796.htm}} in: {{cite journal |journal=JAMA |volume=281 |issue=16 |pages=1481 |year=1999 |doi=10.1001/jama.281.16.1481 |pmid=10227303}}</ref> ] measures are credited with much of the recent increase in life expectancy. During the 20th century, despite a brief drop due to the ],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.gapminder.org/world/#$majorMode=chart$is;shi=t;ly=2003;lb=f;il=t;fs=11;al=30;stl=t;st=t;nsl=t;se=t$wst;tts=C$ts;sp=5.59290322580644;ti=1918$zpv;v=0$inc_x;mmid=XCOORDS;iid=phAwcNAVuyj1jiMAkmq1iMg;by=ind$inc_y;mmid=YCOORDS;iid=phAwcNAVuyj2tPLxKvvnNPA;by=ind$inc_s;uniValue=8.21;iid=phAwcNAVuyj0XOoBL_n5tAQ;by=ind$inc_c;uniValue=255;gid=CATID0;by=grp$map_x;scale=log;dataMin=194;dataMax=96846$map_y;scale=lin;dataMin=23;dataMax=86$map_s;sma=49;smi=2.65$cd;bd=0$inds=;modified=75|title=Gapminder World|publisher=Gapminder Foundation}}</ref> the average lifespan in the United States increased by more than 30 years, of which 25 years can be attributed to advances in public health.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=CDC|title=Ten great public health achievements—United States, 1900–1999|journal=MMWR. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report|volume=48|issue=12|pages=241–243|date=April 1999|pmid=10220250|url=http://cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00056796.htm}} in: {{cite journal|vauthors=|title=From the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Ten great public health achievements—United States, 1900–1999|journal=JAMA|volume=281|issue=16|pages=1481|date=April 1999|pmid=10227303|doi=10.1001/jama.281.16.1481|s2cid=2030845|doi-access=}}</ref>


===Variation in the world today=== ===Regional variations===
{{further|List of countries by life expectancy}}There are great variations in life expectancy between different parts of the world, mostly caused by differences in ], medical care, and diet.{{citation needed|date=November 2024}}
[[Image:Life Expectancy 2008 Estimates CIA World Factbook.png|thumb|400px|CIA World Factbook 2008 Estimates for Life Expectancy at birth (years). {| width=100%
|-
| valign=top |
{{legend|#ff00ff|over 80}}
{{legend|#9f00ff|77.5-80}}
{{legend|#0000ff|75-77.5}}
{{legend|#009fff|72.5-75}}
{{legend|#00ffff|70-72.5}}
{{legend|#00ff00|67.5-70}}
{{legend|#bfff00|65-67.5}}
| valign=top |
{{legend|#ffff00|60-65}}
{{legend|#ffbf00|55-60}}
{{legend|#ff7f00|50-55}}
{{legend|#ff0000|45-50}}
{{legend|#9f0000|40-45}}
{{legend|#000000|under 40}}
{{legend|#bfbfbf|not available}}
|} ]]
There are great variations in life expectancy worldwide, mostly caused by differences in ], medical care and diet from country to country. Climate may also have an effect, and the way data is collected may also be an important influence. According to the ], ] has the world's longest life expectancy of 83.5 years.


Human beings are expected to live on average 60 years in ]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/eswatini/|title=The World Factbook – Central Intelligence Agency|date=4 November 2021}}</ref> and 82.6 years in Japan.{{efn|Japan's recorded life expectancy may have been very slightly increased by counting many infant deaths as stillborn.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Coale AJ, Banister J|date=December 1996|title=Five decades of missing females in China|journal=Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society|volume=140|issue=4|pages=421–450|jstor=987286|author-link=Ansley J. Coale}} Also printed as {{cite journal|vauthors=Coale AJ, Banister J|title=Five decades of missing females in China|journal=Demography|volume=31|issue=3|pages=459–479|date=August 1994|pmid=7828766|doi=10.2307/2061752|s2cid=24724998|doi-access=free|jstor=2061752}}
There are also variations between groups within single countries. Significant differences still remain in life expectancy between men and women in France and other ], with women outliving men by five years or more. These gender differences have been lessening in recent years, with men's life expectancy improving at a faster rate than women's.{{Fact|date=October 2007}} Poverty, in particular, has a very substantial effect on life expectancy. In the United Kingdom life expectancy in the wealthiest areas is on average ten years longer than the poorest areas and the gap appears to be increasing as life expectancy for the prosperous continues to increase while in more deprived communities there is little increase.<ref>Department of Health -: Status report on the Programme for Action</ref> However, in ] the disparity is among the highest in the world with life expectancy for males in the heavily deprived ] standing at fifty-four — twenty-eight years less than in the affluent area of ], which is only eight kilometres away.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7584056.stm#Life%20expectancy|title=Social factors key to ill health|date=2008-08-28|publisher=BBC News|accessdate=2008-08-28}}</ref><ref name="WHO">{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/glasgow_and_west/7584450.stm|title=GP explains life expectancy gap|date=2008-08-28|publisher=BBC News|accessdate=2008-08-28}}</ref>
</ref>}} An analysis published in 2011 in '']'' attributes Japanese life expectancy to ], excellent ], and a healthy diet.<ref name="guardian japan life expectancy">{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/aug/30/japan-life-expectancy-factors|title=Japan's life expectancy 'down to equality and public health measures'|work=The Guardian|date=30 August 2011|access-date=31 August 2011|vauthors=Boseley S|location=London|quote=Japan has the highest life expectancy in the world but the reasons says an analysis, are as much to do with equality and public health measures as diet.... According to a paper in a Lancet series on healthcare in Japan....}}</ref><ref name="lancet what has made the population of japan healthy">{{cite journal|vauthors=Ikeda N, Saito E, Kondo N, Inoue M, Ikeda S, Satoh T, Wada K, Stickley A, Katanoda K, Mizoue T, Noda M, Iso H, Fujino Y, Sobue T, Tsugane S, Naghavi M, Ezzati M, Shibuya K|title=What has made the population of Japan healthy?|journal=Lancet|volume=378|issue=9796|pages=1094–1105|date=September 2011|pmid=21885105|doi=10.1016/S0140-6736(11)61055-6|quote=Reduction in health inequalities with improved average population health was partly attributable to equal educational opportunities and financial access to care.|s2cid=33124920}}</ref>


The ] announced that the ] pandemic reversed the trend of steady gain in life expectancy at birth. The pandemic wiped out nearly a decade of progress in improving life expectancy.<ref>{{cite news|title=COVID-19 eliminated a decade of progress in global level of life expectancy|url=https://www.who.int/news/item/24-05-2024-covid-19-eliminated-a-decade-of-progress-in-global-level-of-life-expectancy|access-date=3 July 2024|publisher=World Health Organization|date=24 May 2024}}</ref>
Life expectancy may also be reduced for people exposed to high levels of ]{{Fact|date=February 2007}} or industrial ]. Occupation may also have a major effect on life expectancy. Well-educated professionals working in offices have a high life expectancy, while coal miners (and in prior generations, asbestos cutters) do not. Other factors affecting an individual's life expectancy are genetic disorders, obesity, access to health care, diet, exercise, ], and excessive drug and alcohol use.


==== Africa ====
As pointed out above, ] has recently had a negative effect on life expectancy, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa.
]<ref>{{cite web|url=http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN/countries/1W|title=Life expectancy at birth, total (years)—Data|publisher=World Bank Group}}</ref>]]


During the last 200 years, African countries have generally not had the same improvements in mortality rates that have been enjoyed by countries in Asia, Latin America, and Europe.<ref>{{cite web|title=Wealth & Health of Nations|url=http://www.gapminder.org/world/#$majorMode=chart$is;shi=t;ly=2003;lb=f;il=t;fs=11;al=30;stl=t;st=t;nsl=t;se=t$wst;tts=C$ts;sp=5.59290322580644;ti=2013$zpv;v=0$inc_x;mmid=XCOORDS;iid=phAwcNAVuyj1jiMAkmq1iMg;by=ind$inc_y;mmid=YCOORDS;iid=phAwcNAVuyj2tPLxKvvnNPA;by=ind$inc_s;uniValue=8.21;iid=phAwcNAVuyj0XOoBL_n5tAQ;by=ind$inc_c;uniValue=255;gid=CATID0;by=grp$map_x;scale=log;dataMin=194;dataMax=96846$map_y;scale=lin;dataMin=23;dataMax=86$map_s;sma=49;smi=2.65$cd;bd=0$inds=;example=75|access-date=26 June 2015|publisher=Gapminder Foundation}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|date=31 August 2022|title=Life Expectancy in the U.S. Dropped for the Second Year in a Row in 2021|url=https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/nchs_press_releases/2022/20220831.htm|access-date=31 August 2022|website=Centers for Disease Control and Prevention}}</ref> This is most apparent by the impact of ] on many African countries. According to projections made by the ] in 2002, the life expectancy at birth for 2010–2015 (if ] did not exist) would have been:<ref>{{cite book|url=https://www.un.org/ESA/population/publications/wpp2002/WPP2002-HIGHLIGHTSrev1.PDFUN|title=World Population Prospects – The 2002 Revision|volume=I: Comprehensive Tables|publisher=United Nations Secretariat, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division|date=2003|page=24|access-date=15 December 2020|archive-date=7 May 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220507023722/https://www.un.org/ESA/population/publications/wpp2002/WPP2002-HIGHLIGHTSrev1.PDFUN|url-status=dead}}{{dead link|date=September 2024}}</ref>
{{further|]}}
* 70.7 years instead of 31.6 years, Botswana
* 69.9 years instead of 41.5 years, South Africa
* 70.5 years instead of 31.8 years, Zimbabwe


===Gender differences=== ==== Eastern Europe ====
On average, ]ans tend to live shorter lives than their western counterparts. For example, ] from ] can expect to live to 85, but ] from the region of ] are predicted to live just past their 73rd birthday. This is in large part due to poor health habits, such as heavy smoking and high alcoholism in the region, and environmental actors, such as high air pollution.<ref>{{cite news|title=Why life expectancy is lower in eastern Europe|date=20 September 2018|url=https://www.economist.com/europe/2018/09/20/why-life-expectancy-is-lower-in-eastern-europe|url-access=subscription|access-date=2024-06-03|newspaper=The Economist|issn=0013-0613|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230731164643/https://www.economist.com/europe/2018/09/20/why-life-expectancy-is-lower-in-eastern-europe|archive-date=2023-07-31}}</ref>


==== United States ====
Women tend to have a lower mortality rate at every age. In the womb, male fetuses have a higher mortality rate (males are conceived at a ratio of about 124 males/100 females, but by birth, the ratio is only 105 males/100 females). Among the smallest premature babies (those under 2 pounds), females have a higher survival rate. At age 110, about 90 percent of the{{Clarifyme|date=February 2009}} population is female, and this increases still higher to about 92 percent by age 112.{{Fact|date=January 2009}}
]In 2022, the life expectancy was 77.5 in the United States, a decline from 2014, but an increase from 2021. In what has been described as a "life expectancy crisis", there were a total of 13 million "missing Americans" from 1980 to 2021, deaths that would have been averted if it had the standard mortality rate of "]".{{citation needed|date=November 2024}}


The annual number of "missing Americans" has been increasing, with 622,534 in 2019 alone.<ref>{{cite web|title=The Missing Americans: Unprecedented US Mortality Far Exceeds Other Wealthy Nations|url=https://www.bu.edu/sph/news/articles/2023/the-missing-americans-unprecedented-us-mortality-far-exceeds-other-wealthy-nations/|access-date=2024-06-03|publisher=Boston University|department=School of Public Health|language=en|date=14 July 2023|first1=Jillian|last1=McKoy}}</ref> Most excess deaths in the United States can largely be attributed to increasing ], ], ]s, ], ]s, and ]s, with ], ]s, and ] being linked to most of them.<ref>{{cite web|vauthors=Berg S|date=2023-03-10|title=What doctors wish patients knew about falling U.S. life expectancy|url=https://www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/public-health/what-doctors-wish-patients-knew-about-falling-us-life-expectancy|access-date=2024-06-03|publisher=American Medical Association|language=en}}</ref>
If one does not consider the many women who die while giving birth or in pregnancy, or infanticide, the female human life expectancy is considerably higher than those of men. The reasons for this are not entirely certain. Traditional arguments tend to favor socio-environmental factors: men, on average, consume more ], ] and ]s than females in most societies. In most countries many more men than women commit ]. In general, men are more likely to be murdered. In wars, many men die in combat as soldiers. Men tend to take more risks than females when driving motor vehicles.<ref>http://www.northjersey.com/page.php?qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjczN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkyNjcmZmdiZWw3Zjd2cWVlRUV5eTY4NzMxNDEmeXJpcnk3ZjcxN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXk5</ref>


] have generally shorter life expectancies than their ] counterparts. For example, white Americans in 2010 are expected to live until age 78.9, but black Americans only until age 75.1. This 3.8-year gap, however, is the lowest it has been since 1975 at the latest, the greatest difference being 7.1 years in 1993.<ref name="Final 2010 data">{{cite journal|vauthors=Murphy SL, Xu JQ, Kochanek KD, Curtin SC, Arias E|title=Deaths: Final Data for 2010|journal=National Vital Statistics Reports|volume=61|issue=4|location=Hyattsville, MD|publisher=National Center for Health Statistics=|date=2013|pages=1–117|pmid=24979972|url=https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr61/nvsr61_04.pdf}}</ref> In contrast, ] women live the longest of all ethnic and gender groups in the United States, with a life expectancy of 85.8 years.<ref>{{cite web|publisher=United States Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Minority Health|url=http://minorityhealth.hhs.gov/templates/browse.aspx?lvl=2&lvlID=53|title=Asian American/Pacific Islander Profile|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120204024943/http://minorityhealth.hhs.gov/templates/browse.aspx?lvl=2&lvlid=53|archive-date=4 February 2012}}</ref> The life expectancy of ] is 81.2 years.<ref name="Final 2010 data" />
However, such arguments are not entirely satisfactory, even if the statistics are corrected for known socio-environmental effects on mortality, females still have longer life expectancy. Interestingly, the age of equalization (about 13) tends to be close to the age of ], suggesting a potential reproductive-equilibrium explanation. Women, whose reproductive cycle tends to result in regular blood loss, are better-able to cope with blood loss and trauma.{{Dubious|Gender differences|date=February 2009}}


==== Japan ====
Some argue that shorter male life expectancy is merely another manifestation of the general rule, seen in all mammal species, that larger individuals tend on average to have shorter lives. <ref>http://jerrymondo.tripod.com/lgev/id1.html</ref><ref>Samaras, Thomas T. und Heigh, Gregory H.: How human size affects longevity and mortality from degenerative diseases. Townsend Letter for Doctors & Patients 159: 78-85, 133-139</ref> If small body size is a result of poor nutrition and not of genetics, then the rule is the other way around: better nourished people are taller and live longer. <ref>http://www.oberlin.edu/alummag/oamcurrent/oam_may99/tall.html</ref>
In 2023, the life expectancy was 84.5 in Japan, 4.2 years above the ] average, and one of the highest in the world. Japan's high life expectancy can largely be explained by their healthy diets, which are low on ], ], and red meat. For these reasons, Japan has a low ] rate, and ultimately low mortality from ] and ]s.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Tsugane S|title=Why has Japan become the world's most long-lived country: insights from a food and nutrition perspective|journal=European Journal of Clinical Nutrition|volume=75|issue=6|pages=921–928|date=June 2021|pmid=32661353|pmc=8189904|doi=10.1038/s41430-020-0677-5}}</ref>


==== In cities ====
===Lower life expectancy in people with serious mental illness===
Cities also experience a wide range of life expectancy based on neighborhood breakdowns. This is largely due to economic clustering and poverty conditions that tend to associate based on geographic location. Multi-generational poverty found in struggling neighborhoods also contributes. In American cities such as ], the life expectancy gap between low income and high-income neighborhoods touches 20 years.<ref name="waterfields">{{cite web|url=http://waterfieldsllc.com/about-waterfields/social-mission/root-causes-poverty/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150906041120/http://waterfieldsllc.com/about-waterfields/social-mission/root-causes-poverty/|archive-date=6 September 2015|title=The Root Causes of Poverty|publisher=Waterfields, LLC|location=Cincinnati, Ohio|access-date=2015-03-04}}</ref>


===Economic circumstances===
<gallery>
{{See also|Preston curve}}
Image:Smi_graph_by_Mark.png|
].<ref name=life>{{cite journal|url=https://ourworldindata.org/the-link-between-life-expectancy-and-health-spending-us-focus|title=Link between health spending and life expectancy: US is an outlier|date=26 May 2017|vauthors=Roser M|author-link1=Max Roser|journal=]}} Click the sources tab under the chart for info on the countries, healthcare expenditures, and data sources. See the later version of the chart .</ref>]]
</gallery>
Economic circumstances also affect life expectancy. For example, in the United Kingdom, life expectancy in the wealthiest and richest areas is several years higher than in the poorest areas. This may reflect factors such as diet and lifestyle, as well as access to medical care. It may also reflect a selective effect: people with chronic life-threatening illnesses are less likely to become wealthy or to reside in affluent areas.<ref>{{cite web|publisher=Department of Health|location=UK|url=http://www.dh.gov.uk/PublicationsAndStatistics/Publications/PublicationsPolicyAndGuidance/PublicationsPolicyAndGuidanceArticle/fs/en?CONTENT_ID=4117696&chk=OXFbWI|title=Tackling health inequalities: Status report on the Programme for Action|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070205110912/http://www.dh.gov.uk/PublicationsAndStatistics/Publications/PublicationsPolicyAndGuidance/PublicationsPolicyAndGuidanceArticle/fs/en?CONTENT_ID=4117696&chk=OXFbWI|archive-date=5 February 2007}}</ref> In ], the disparity is ]: life expectancy for males in the heavily deprived ] area stands at 54, which is 28 years less than in the affluent area of ], which is only {{Convert|8|km|mi|abbr=on}} away.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7584056.stm#Life%20expectancy|title=Social factors key to ill health|date=28 August 2008|publisher=BBC News|access-date=28 August 2008}}</ref><ref name="WHO">{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/glasgow_and_west/7584450.stm|title=GP explains life expectancy gap|date=28 August 2008|publisher=BBC News|access-date=28 August 2008}}</ref>
Persons with serious ] die, on average, 25 years earlier than the general public.
*
*
Mental illnesses such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and major depression. Three out of five mentally ill die from mostly preventable physical diseases. Diseases such as Heart/], ], ], Respiratory ailments, ], ].
<!-- Image with unknown copyright status removed: ] -->


A 2013 study found a pronounced relationship between ] and life expectancy.<ref name=WaPoLifespan>{{cite news|vauthors=Fletcher MA|title=Research ties economic inequality to gap in life expectancy|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/research-ties-economic-inequality-to-gap-in-life-expectancy/2013/03/10/c7a323c4-7094-11e2-8b8d-e0b59a1b8e2a_story.html|access-date=23 March 2013|newspaper=The Washington Post|date=10 March 2013}}</ref> However, in contrast, a study by José A. Tapia Granados and ] at the ] found that life expectancy actually ''increased'' during the ], and during recessions and depressions in general.<ref>{{cite web|publisher=University of Michigan|work=ScienceDaily|url=https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/090928172530.htm|title=Did The Great Depression Have A Silver Lining? Life Expectancy Increased By 6.2 Years|date=29 September 2009|access-date=3 April 2011}}</ref> The authors suggest that when people are working at a more extreme degree during prosperous economic times, they undergo more ], exposure to ], and the likelihood of injury among other longevity-limiting factors.
== Evolution and aging rate ==


Life expectancy is also likely to be affected by exposure to high levels of ] or industrial ]. This is one way that occupation can have a major effect on life expectancy. Coal miners (and in prior generations, asbestos cutters) often have lower life expectancies than average. Other factors affecting an individual's life expectancy are genetic disorders, drug use, ], excessive alcohol consumption, obesity, access to health care, diet, and exercise.
The differing lifespans within various species of plants and animals, including humans, raises the question of why such lifespans are observed.


===Sex differences===
The evolutionary theory states that organisms that are able by virtue of their defenses or lifestyle to live for long periods whilst avoiding accidents, disease, predation etc. are likely to have genes that code for slow aging - good repair.
]
]. (2015)<ref>{{cite web|url=http://smart-unit-converter.com/life-expectancy.php|title=How long will I live? Estimate remaining life expectancy for all countries in the world|vauthors=Pele L}}</ref>]]
] for 2019. Open the original and hover over a bubble to show its data. The square of the bubbles is proportional to country population based on estimation of the ].]]
In the present, female human life expectancy is greater than that of males, despite females having higher morbidity rates (see ]). There are many potential reasons for this. Traditional arguments tend to favor sociology-environmental factors: historically, men have generally consumed more ], ], and ]s than women in most societies, and are more likely to die from many associated diseases such as ], ], and ].<ref name=worldhealth/> Men are also more likely to die from injuries, whether unintentional (such as ], ], or ]) or intentional (]).<ref name=worldhealth>{{cite web|publisher=World Health Organization|year=2004|work=The world health report 2004 – changing history|title=Annex Table 2: Deaths by cause, sex and mortality stratum in WHO regions, estimates for 2002|url=https://www.who.int/entity/whr/2004/annex/topic/en/annex_2_en.pdf|access-date=1 November 2008}}</ref> Men are also more likely to die from most of the leading causes of death (some already stated above) than women. Some of these in the United States include cancer of the respiratory system, motor vehicle accidents, suicide, cirrhosis of the liver, emphysema, prostate cancer, and coronary heart disease.<ref name="Santrock"/> These far outweigh the female mortality rate from breast cancer and cervical cancer. In the past, ] were higher than for males at the same age.


A paper from 2015 found that female foetuses have a higher mortality rate than male foetuses.<ref name="pmid25825766">{{cite journal|vauthors=Orzack SH, Stubblefield JW, Akmaev VR, Colls P, Munné S, Scholl T, Steinsaltz D, Zuckerman JE|title=The human sex ratio from conception to birth|journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America|volume=112|issue=16|pages=E2102–11|date=April 2015|pmid=25825766|pmc=4413259|doi=10.1073/pnas.1416546112|doi-access=free|bibcode=2015PNAS..112E2102O}}</ref> This finding contradicts papers dating from 2002 and earlier that attribute the male sex to higher in-utero mortality rates.<ref name = "Kalben_2000">{{cite journal|vauthors=Kalben BB|title=Why men die younger: causes of mortality differences by sex.|journal=North American Actuarial Journal|date=October 2000|volume=4|issue=4|pages=83–111|doi=10.1080/10920277.2000.10595939|url=http://www.soa.org/library/monographs/life/why-men-die-younger-causes-of-mortality-differences-by-sex/2001/january/m-li01-1-05.pdf|access-date=31 October 2011|archive-date=13 September 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170913135329/http://www.soa.org/library/monographs/life/why-men-die-younger-causes-of-mortality-differences-by-sex/2001/january/m-li01-1-05.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Naeye RL, Burt LS, Wright DL, Blanc WA, Tatter D|title=Neonatal mortality, the male disadvantage|journal=Pediatrics|volume=48|issue=6|pages=902–906|date=December 1971|pmid=5129451|doi=10.1542/peds.48.6.902}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Waldron I|title=Sex differences in human mortality: the role of genetic factors|journal=Social Science & Medicine|volume=17|issue=6|pages=321–333|date=1983-01-01|pmid=6344225|doi=10.1016/0277-9536(83)90234-4|author-link1=Ingrid Waldron}}</ref> Among the smallest premature babies (those under {{Convert|2|lb|g|abbr=none}}), females have a higher survival rate. At the other extreme, about 90% of individuals aged 110 are female. The difference in life expectancy between men and women in the United States dropped from 7.8&nbsp;years in 1979 to 5.3&nbsp;years in 2005, with women expected to live to age&nbsp;80.1 in 2005.<ref>{{cite web|vauthors=Hitti M|title=U.S. Life Expectancy Best Ever, Says CDC|work=eMedicine|publisher=]|date=28 February 2005|url=http://www.webmd.com/healthy-aging/news/20050228/us-life-expectancy-best-ever-says-cdc|access-date=18 January 2011}}</ref> Data from the United Kingdom shows the gap in life expectancy between men and women decreasing in later life. This may be attributable to the effects of infant mortality and young adult death rates.<ref>{{cite web|title=Life expectancy—care quality indicators|url=http://www.qualitywatch.org.uk/indicator/life-expectancy#vis-ref_221|website=QualityWatch|publisher=Nuffield Trust & Health Foundation|access-date=16 April 2015}}</ref>
This is so because if a random genetic trait found in the organism increases its survivability, it is more likely to pass on its genes to the next generation. Thus, a member of the population with genes that lend to increased survivability will tend to reproduce more and have more successors. This gene which increases survivability will thus be increasingly spread throughout the species, increasing the survivability of the species as a whole.


Some argue that shorter male life expectancy is merely another manifestation of the general rule, seen in all mammal species, that larger-sized individuals within a species tend, on average, to have shorter lives.<ref>{{cite web|vauthors=Stindl R|url=http://jerrymondo.tripod.com/lgev/id1.html|title=Telemores, sexual size dimorphism and gender gap in life expectancy|publisher=Jerrymondo.tripod.com|access-date=4 November 2010}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Samaras TT, Heigh GH|title=How human size affects longevity and mortality from degenerative diseases|journal=Townsend Letter for Doctors & Patients|volume=159|issue=78–85|pages=133–139}}</ref> This biological difference{{clarify|date=September 2022}} occurs because women have more resistance to infections and degenerative diseases.<ref name="Santrock"/>
Conversely a change to the environment that means that organisms die younger from a common disease or a new threat from a predator will mean that organisms that have genes that code for putting more energy into ] than repair will do better.


In her extensive review of the existing literature, Kalben concluded that the fact that women live longer than men was observed at least as far back as 1750 and that, with relatively equal treatment, today males in all parts of the world experience greater mortality than females. However, Kalben's study was restricted to data in Western Europe alone, where the demographic transition occurred relatively early. United Nations statistics from mid-twentieth century onward, show that in all parts of the world, females have a higher life expectancy at age 60 than males.<ref>{{cite web|work=Department of Economic and Social Affairs|page=53|title=World Population Ageing 2015 (ST/ESA/SER.A/390)|url=https://www.un.org/en/development/desa/population/publications/pdf/ageing/WPA2015_Report.pdf|publisher=United Nations|access-date=11 March 2021}}</ref> Of 72 selected causes of death, only 6 yielded greater female than male age-adjusted death rates in 1998 in the United States. Except for birds, for almost all of the animal species studied, males have higher mortality than females. Evidence suggests that the sex mortality differential in people is due to both biological/genetic and environmental/behavioral risk and protective factors.<ref name = "Kalben_2000" />
The support for this theory includes the fact that better defended animals, for example small birds that can fly away from danger live for a decade or more whereas mice which cannot, die of old age in a year or two. Tortoises and turtles are very well defended indeed and can live for over a hundred years. A classic study comparing opossums on a protected island with unprotected opossums also supports this theory.{{Fact|date=September 2007}}


One recent suggestion is that ]l mutations which shorten lifespan continue to be expressed in males (but less so in females) because mitochondria are inherited only through the mother. By contrast, ] weeds out mitochondria that reduce female survival; therefore, such mitochondria are less likely to be passed on to the next generation. This thus suggests that females tend to live longer than males. The authors claim that this is a partial explanation.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-19093442|title=Fruit flies offer DNA clue to why women live longer|publisher=BBC News|date=2 August 2012}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|vauthors=Myers PZ|author-link1=PZ Myers|date=6 February 2013|url=http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/02/06/mothers-curse/|title=Mother's Curse}}</ref>
But there are also counterexamples, suggesting that there is more to the story. ] in predator-free habitats evolve shorter life spans than nearby populations of guppies where predators exact a large toll. A broad survey of mammals indicates many more exceptions. The theory of ] may be in flux.


Another explanation is the ]. According to this hypothesis, one reason for why the average lifespan of males is not as long as that of females––by 18% on average, according to the study––is that they have a ] which cannot protect an individual from harmful genes expressed on the X chromosome, while a duplicate X chromosome, as present in female organisms, can ensure harmful genes are not ].<ref>{{cite news|vauthors=Gilbert L|date=4 March 2020|title=Why men (and other male animals) die younger: It's all in the Y chromosome|url=https://phys.org/news/2020-03-men-male-animals-die-younger.html|access-date=5 April 2020|work=phys.org}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Xirocostas ZA, Everingham SE, Moles AT|title=The sex with the reduced sex chromosome dies earlier: a comparison across the tree of life|journal=Biology Letters|volume=16|issue=3|pages=20190867|date=March 2020|pmid=32126186|pmc=7115182|doi=10.1098/rsbl.2019.0867|doi-access=free}}</ref>
Another main counterexample is that the evolutionary traits best for short term survival may be detrimental to long term survival. For example, a ]'s extremely fast wings allow it to escape from predators and to find mates, assuring that the ] for fast wings is passed on, explained by ]. However, these fast wings can be detrimental to the hummingbird's long term health, as the wings consume vast amounts of ] (cellular energy molecules) and cause the hummingbird's ] to deteriorate with permanent and long-term wear. This allows for hummingbirds to effectively survive and reproduce, however as a result, hummingbirds usually die shortly after reproducing.


In developed countries, starting around 1880, death rates decreased faster among women, leading to differences in mortality rates between males and females. Before 1880, death rates were the same. In people born after 1900, the death rate of 50- to 70-year-old men was double that of women of the same age. Men may be more vulnerable to cardiovascular disease than women, but this susceptibility was evident only after deaths from other causes, such as infections, started to decline.<ref>{{cite web|vauthors=Rettner R|title=When Did Women Start to Outlive Men?|website=]|date=6 July 2015|url=http://www.livescience.com/51455-women-outlive-men.html|access-date=2015-07-08}}</ref> Most of the difference in life expectancy between the sexes is accounted for by differences in the rate of death by cardiovascular diseases among persons aged 50–70.<ref name="pmid26150507">{{cite journal|vauthors=Beltrán-Sánchez H, Finch CE, Crimmins EM|title=Twentieth century surge of excess adult male mortality|journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America|volume=112|issue=29|pages=8993–8|date=July 2015|pmid=26150507|pmc=4517277|doi=10.1073/pnas.1421942112|doi-access=free|bibcode=2015PNAS..112.8993B}}</ref>
Short term survival traits are usually those that are most commonly passed on in ]. However, humans with technology have prioritized their traits to improve long term survival, as they have already developed short term survival to a significant extent by ensuring their dominance of the food chain. This is known as ].


===Genetics===
==Calculating life expectancies==
{{Further|Genetics of aging}}
The ] of lifespan is estimated to be less than 10%, meaning the majority of ] in lifespan is attributable due to differences in environment rather than ].<ref name="lifespan_heritability">{{cite journal|vauthors=Ruby JG, Wright KM, Rand KA, Kermany A, Noto K, Curtis D, Varner N, Garrigan D, Slinkov D, Dorfman I, Granka JM, Byrnes J, Myres N, Ball C|title=Estimates of the Heritability of Human Longevity Are Substantially Inflated due to Assortative Mating|journal=Genetics|volume=210|issue=3|pages=1109–1124|date=November 2018|pmid=30401766|pmc=6218226|doi=10.1534/genetics.118.301613}}</ref> However, researchers have identified regions of the ] which can influence the length of life and the number of years lived in good health. For example, a ] of 1 million lifespans found 12 ] which influenced lifespan by modifying susceptibility to ] and ].<ref name="timmers_elife">{{cite journal|vauthors=Timmers PR, Mounier N, Lall K, Fischer K, Ning Z, Feng X, Bretherick AD, Clark DW, Shen X, Esko T, Kutalik Z, Wilson JF, Joshi PK|title=Genomics of 1 million parent lifespans implicates novel pathways and common diseases and distinguishes survival chances|journal=eLife|volume=8|issue=e39856|date=January 2019|pmid=30642433|pmc=6333444|doi=10.7554/eLife.39856|doi-access=free}}</ref> The locus with the largest effect is ]. Carriers of the APOE ε4 ] live approximately one year less than average (per copy of the ε4 allele), mainly due to increased risk of ].<ref name="timmers_elife" />


]
The starting point for calculating life expectancies is the ]s of the population members. For example, if 10% of a group of people alive at their 90th birthday die before their 91st birthday, then the age-specific death rate at age 90 would be 10%.


In July 2020, scientists identified 10 genomic loci with consistent effects across multiple lifespan-related traits, including ], lifespan, and ].<ref name="Multivariate">{{cite journal|vauthors=Timmers PR, Wilson JF, Joshi PK, Deelen J|title=Multivariate genomic scan implicates novel loci and haem metabolism in human ageing|journal=Nature Communications|volume=11|issue=1|pages=3570|date=July 2020|pmid=32678081|pmc=7366647|doi=10.1038/s41467-020-17312-3|bibcode=2020NatCo..11.3570T|doi-access=free}}</ref> The genes affected by variation in these loci highlighted ] as a promising candidate for further research within the field. This study suggests that high levels of iron in the blood likely reduce, and genes involved in metabolising iron likely increase healthy years of life in humans.<ref name="ironmeta">{{cite news|author=University of Edinburgh|date=20 July 2020|title=Blood iron levels could be key to slowing ageing, gene study shows|url=https://phys.org/news/2020-07-blood-iron-key-ageing-gene.html|access-date=18 August 2020|work=phys.org}}</ref>
These values are then used to calculate a ], from which one can calculate the probability of surviving to each age. In ] the probability of surviving from age x to age x+n is denoted <math>\,_np_x\!</math> and the probability of dying during age x (i.e. between ages x and x+1) is denoted <math>q_x\!</math>.


A follow-up study which investigated the genetics of ] and self-rated health in addition to healthspan, lifespan, and longevity also highlighted haem metabolism as an important pathway, and found genetic variants which lower blood protein levels of ] and ] were associated with increased healthy lifespan.<ref name="timmers_nataging">{{cite journal|vauthors=Timmers PR, Tiys ES, Sakaue S, Akiyama M, Kiiskinen TT, Zhou W, Hwang SJ, Yao C, Deelen J, Levy D, Ganna A, Kamatani Y, Okada Y, Joshi PK, Wilson JF, Tsepilov YA|title=Mendelian randomization of genetically independent aging phenotypes identifies LPA and VCAM1 as biological targets for human aging|journal=Nature Aging|volume=2|issue=1|pages=19–30|date=January 2022|pmid=37118362|doi=10.1038/s43587-021-00159-8|hdl-access=free|s2cid=246093885|doi-access=free|hdl=20.500.11820/1bac547c-2eb9-47e1-b4b8-e80d741941c7}}</ref>
The life expectancy at age x, denoted <math>\,e_x\!</math>, is then calculated by adding up the probabilities to survive to every age. This is the expected number of complete years lived (one may think of it as the number of birthdays they celebrate).


===Centenarians===
:<math>e_x =\sum_{t=1}^{\infty}\,_tp_x = \sum_{t=0}^{\infty}t \,_tp_x q_{x+t}</math>
{{Main|Centenarian}}
In developed countries, the number of centenarians is increasing at approximately 5.5% per year, which means doubling the centenarian population every 13&nbsp;years, pushing it from some 455,000 in 2009 to 4.1&nbsp;million in 2050.<ref>United Nations ; ST/ESA/SER.A/295, Population Division, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, United Nations, New York, October 2010, liv + 73 pp.</ref> Japan is the country with the highest ratio of centenarians (347 for every 1&nbsp;million inhabitants in September 2010). ] had an estimated 743 centenarians per million inhabitants.<ref>{{cite web|work=The Japan Times|url=http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20100915a8.html|title=Centenarians to Hit Record 44,000|date=15 September 2010}} ] 667 centenarians per 1 million inhabitants in September 2010, had been for a long time the Japanese prefecture with the largest ratio of centenarians, partly because it also had the largest loss of young and middle-aged population during the ].</ref>


In the United States, the number of centenarians grew from 32,194 in 1980 to 71,944 in November 2010 (232 centenarians per million inhabitants).<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.census.gov/popest/national/asrh/2009-nat-res.html|title=Resident Population. National Population Estimates for the 2000s. Monthly Postcensal Resident Population, by single year of age, sex, race, and Hispanic Origin|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131010072957/http://www.census.gov/popest/national/asrh/2009-nat-res.html|archive-date=10 October 2013|work=Bureau of the Census}} Different figures, based on earlier assumptions (104,754 centenarians on Nov.1, 2009) are provided in {{cite web|url=https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/pdf/cb10-ff06.pdf|title=Older Americans Month|date=May 2010|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160216221613/http://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/pdf/cb10-ff06.pdf|archive-date=16 February 2016|publisher=Bureau of the Census|work=Facts for Features|page=5}}</ref>
Because age is rounded down to the last birthday, on average people live half a year beyond their final birthday, so half a year is added to the life expectancy to calculate the full life expectancy.


===Mental illness===
An average age for death expectancy is very close life expectancy (and exactly same for the exponential growth of death rate with increasing age).
Mental illness is reported to occur in approximately 18% of the average American population.<ref>{{cite web|vauthors=Bekiempis V|url=http://www.newsweek.com/nearly-1-5-americans-suffer-mental-illness-each-year-230608|title=Nearly 1 in 5 Americans Suffers From Mental Illness Each Year|website=]|date=28 February 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Steel Z, Marnane C, Iranpour C, Chey T, Jackson JW, Patel V, Silove D|title=The global prevalence of common mental disorders: a systematic review and meta-analysis 1980–2013|journal=International Journal of Epidemiology|volume=43|issue=2|pages=476–493|date=April 2014|pmid=24648481|pmc=3997379|doi=10.1093/ije/dyu038}}</ref>


]
:<math>e_x = \frac{\sum_{t=x}^{\infty}\,tq_tl_t}{\sum_{t=x}^{\infty}\,q_tl_t},</math>


The mentally ill have been shown to have a 10- to 25-year reduction in life expectancy.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/05/30/upshot/mental-illness-health-disparity-longevity.html|title=The Largest Health Disparity We Don't Talk About|newspaper=The New York Times|date=2018-05-30|vauthors=Khullar D}}</ref> Generally, the reduction of lifespan in the mentally ill population compared to the mentally stable population has been studied and documented.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Wahlbeck K, Westman J, Nordentoft M, Gissler M, Laursen TM|title=Outcomes of Nordic mental health systems: life expectancy of patients with mental disorders|journal=The British Journal of Psychiatry|volume=199|issue=6|pages=453–458|date=December 2011|pmid=21593516|doi=10.1192/bjp.bp.110.085100|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Reininghaus U, Dutta R, Dazzan P, Doody GA, Fearon P, Lappin J, Heslin M, Onyejiaka A, Donoghue K, Lomas B, Kirkbride JB, Murray RM, Croudace T, Morgan C, Jones PB|title=Mortality in schizophrenia and other psychoses: a 10-year follow-up of the ӔSOP first-episode cohort|journal=Schizophrenia Bulletin|volume=41|issue=3|pages=664–673|date=May 2015|pmid=25262443|pmc=4393685|doi=10.1093/schbul/sbu138}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Laursen TM, Munk-Olsen T, Vestergaard M|title=Life expectancy and cardiovascular mortality in persons with schizophrenia|journal=Current Opinion in Psychiatry|volume=25|issue=2|pages=83–88|date=March 2012|pmid=22249081|doi=10.1097/YCO.0b013e32835035ca|s2cid=13646442}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/861159|title=Antipsychotics Linked to Mortality in Parkinson's|website=Medscape|access-date=9 April 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Rosenbaum L|title=Closing the Mortality Gap – Mental Illness and Medical Care|journal=The New England Journal of Medicine|volume=375|issue=16|pages=1585–1589|date=October 2016|pmid=27797313|doi=10.1056/NEJMms1610125}}</ref>
Life expectancy is by definition an ]. It can be calculated also by integrating the survival curve from ages 0 to positive infinity (the maximum lifespan, sometimes called 'omega'). For an extinct ] (all people born in year 1850, for example), of course, it can simply be calculated by averaging the ages at death. For cohorts with some survivors it is estimated by using mortality experience in recent years.


The greater mortality of people with mental disorders may be due to death from injury, from ] conditions, or medication side effects.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.northamptonchron.co.uk/news/inquest-told-there-was-a-lost-opportunity-to-treat-mental-health-patient-who-died-following-severe-constipation-1-5244246|title=Inquest told there was a "lost opportunity" to treat mental health patient who died following severe constipation|access-date=25 July 2017|archive-date=9 April 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190409015423/https://www.northamptonchron.co.uk/news/inquest-told-there-was-a-lost-opportunity-to-treat-mental-health-patient-who-died-following-severe-constipation-1-5244246|url-status=dead}}</ref> For instance, psychiatric medications can increase the risk of developing ].<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Kumar PN, Thomas B|title=Hyperglycemia associated with olanzapine treatment|journal=Indian Journal of Psychiatry|volume=53|issue=2|pages=176–177|date=April 2011|pmid=21772658|pmc=3136028|doi=10.4103/0019-5545.82562|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/06/business/06zyprexa.html|title=Lilly Adds Strong Warning Label to Zyprexa, a Schizophrenia Drug|date=6 October 2007|work=The New York Times|access-date=9 April 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0RDZdDW0EqEC&q=zyprexa%20increase%20the%20chance%20of%20developing%20the%20disease%20of%20diabetes&pg=PA17|title=Type 2 Diabetes, Pre-Diabetes, and the Metabolic Syndrome|vauthors=Codario RA|date=28 October 2007|publisher=Springer Science & Business Media|isbn=978-1-59259-932-5}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/863871|title=Antipsychotic-Related Metabolic Testing Falls Far Short|publisher=MedScape|access-date=9 April 2018}}</ref> It has been shown that the psychiatric medication ] can increase risk of developing ], among other comorbidities.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Alvir JM, Lieberman JA, Safferman AZ, Schwimmer JL, Schaaf JA|title=Clozapine-induced agranulocytosis. Incidence and risk factors in the United States|journal=The New England Journal of Medicine|volume=329|issue=3|pages=162–167|date=July 1993|pmid=8515788|doi=10.1056/NEJM199307153290303|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2010/020592s057,021086s036,021253s045lbl.pdf|title=Zyprexa Prescribing Information|date=2010|website=U.S. Food Drug and Administration}}</ref> Psychiatric medicines also affect the ]; the mentally ill have a four times risk of gastrointestinal disease.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Philpott HL, Nandurkar S, Lubel J, Gibson PR|title=Drug-induced gastrointestinal disorders|journal=Frontline Gastroenterology|volume=5|issue=1|pages=49–57|date=January 2014|pmid=28839751|pmc=5369702|doi=10.1136/flgastro-2013-100316}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Rege S, Lafferty T|title=Life-threatening constipation associated with clozapine|journal=Australasian Psychiatry|volume=16|issue=3|pages=216–219|date=June 2008|pmid=18568631|doi=10.1080/10398560701882203|s2cid=32093594}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Hibbard KR, Propst A, Frank DE, Wyse J|title=Fatalities associated with clozapine-related constipation and bowel obstruction: a literature review and two case reports|journal=Psychosomatics|volume=50|issue=4|pages=416–419|year=2009|pmid=19687183|doi=10.1176/appi.psy.50.4.416|doi-access=free}}</ref>
Note that no allowance has been made in this calculation for expected changes in life expectancy in the future. Usually when life expectancy figures are quoted, they have been calculated like this with no allowance for expected future changes. This means that quoted life expectancy figures are not generally appropriate for calculating how long any given individual of a particular age is expected to live, as they effectively assume that current death rates will be "frozen" and not change in the future. Instead, life expectancy figures can be thought of as a useful statistic to summarize the current health status of a population. Some models do exist to account for the evolution of mortality (e.g., the Lee-Carter model<ref>Ronald D. Lee and Lawrence Carter. 1992. "Modeling and Forecasting the Time Series of U.S. Mortality," ''Journal of the American Statistical Association'' 87
(September): 659-671.</ref>).


As of 2020 and the ] pandemic, researchers have found an increased risk of death in the mentally ill.<ref name="pmid33502436">{{cite journal|vauthors=Nemani K, Li C, Olfson M, Blessing EM, Razavian N, Chen J, Petkova E, Goff DC|title=Association of Psychiatric Disorders With Mortality Among Patients With COVID-19|journal=JAMA Psychiatry|volume=78|issue=4|pages=380–386|date=April 2021|pmid=33502436|pmc=7841576|doi=10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2020.4442}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Wang Q, Xu R, Volkow ND|title=Increased risk of COVID-19 infection and mortality in people with mental disorders: analysis from electronic health records in the United States|journal=World Psychiatry|volume=20|issue=1|pages=124–130|date=February 2021|pmid=33026219|pmc=7675495|doi=10.1002/wps.20806}}</ref><ref name="pmid32997123">{{cite journal|vauthors=Li L, Li F, Fortunati F, Krystal JH|title=Association of a Prior Psychiatric Diagnosis With Mortality Among Hospitalized Patients With Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Infection|journal=JAMA Network Open|volume=3|issue=9|pages=e2023282|date=September 2020|pmid=32997123|pmc=7527869|doi=10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2020.23282}}</ref>
==See also==

===Other illnesses===
The life expectancy of people with diabetes, which is 9.3% of the U.S. population, is reduced by roughly 10–20 years.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.diabetes.co.uk/diabetes-life-expectancy.html|title=Diabetes Life Expectancy – Type 1 and Type 2 Life Expectancy|date=15 January 2019}}</ref><ref></ref> People over 60 years old with ] have about a 50% life expectancy of 3–10 years.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Zanetti O, Solerte SB, Cantoni F|title=Life expectancy in Alzheimer's disease (AD)|journal=Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics|volume=49|issue=Suppl 1|pages=237–243|date=2009|pmid=19836639|doi=10.1016/j.archger.2009.09.035}}</ref> Other demographics that tend to have a lower life expectancy than average include transplant recipients<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Kiberd BA, Keough-Ryan T, Clase CM|title=Screening for prostate, breast and colorectal cancer in renal transplant recipients|journal=American Journal of Transplantation|volume=3|issue=5|pages=619–625|date=May 2003|pmid=12752319|doi=10.1034/j.1600-6143.2003.00118.x|s2cid=20247054|doi-access=free}}</ref> and the obese.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Diehr P, O'Meara ES, Fitzpatrick A, Newman AB, Kuller L, Burke G|title=Weight, mortality, years of healthy life, and active life expectancy in older adults|journal=Journal of the American Geriatrics Society|volume=56|issue=1|pages=76–83|date=January 2008|pmid=18031486|pmc=3865852|doi=10.1111/j.1532-5415.2007.01500.x|author-link=Paula Diehr}}</ref>

=== Education ===
Education on all levels has been shown to be strongly associated with increased life expectancy.<ref name="Hummer_2013">{{cite journal|vauthors=Hummer RA, Hernandez EM|title=The Effect of Educational Attainment on Adult Mortality in the United States|journal=Population Bulletin|volume=68|issue=1|pages=1–16|date=June 2013|pmid=25995521|pmc=4435622}}</ref> This association may be due partly to higher income,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bls.gov/careeroutlook/2018/data-on-display/education-pays.htm|title=Measuring the value of education : Career Outlook: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics|vauthors=Torpey E|website=bls.gov|access-date=2019-03-10}}</ref> which can lead to increased life expectancy. Despite the association, among identical twin pairs with different education levels, there is only weak evidence of a relationship between educational attainment and adult mortality.<ref name="Hummer_2013" />

According to a paper from 2015, the mortality rate for the Caucasian population in the United States from 1993 to 2001 is four times higher{{dubious|date=September 2022}} for those who did not complete high school compared to those who have at least 16 years of education.<ref name="Hummer_2013" /> In fact, within the U.S. adult population, people with less than a high school education have the shortest life expectancies.

Preschool education also plays a large role in life expectancy. It was found that high-quality early-stage childhood education had positive effects on health. Researchers discovered this by analyzing the results of the ], finding that the disadvantaged children who were randomly assigned to treatment had lower instances of risk factors for cardiovascular and metabolic diseases in their mid-30s.<ref name="pmid24675955">{{cite journal|vauthors=Campbell F, Conti G, Heckman JJ, Moon SH, Pinto R, Pungello E, Pan Y|title=Early childhood investments substantially boost adult health|journal=Science|location=New York, N.Y.|volume=343|issue=6178|pages=1478–85|date=March 2014|pmid=24675955|pmc=4028126|doi=10.1126/science.1248429|bibcode=2014Sci...343.1478C}}</ref>

==Evolution and aging rate==
{{Main|Life history theory}}

Various species of plants and animals, including humans, have different lifespans. Evolutionary theory states that organisms which—by virtue of their defenses or lifestyle—live for long periods and avoid accidents, disease, predation, etc. are likely to have genes that code for slow aging, which often translates to good cellular repair. One theory is that if predation or accidental deaths prevent most individuals from living to an old age, there will be less natural selection to increase the intrinsic life span.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Williams G|title=Pleiotropy, natural selection, and the evolution of senescence|journal=Evolution|volume=11|pages=398–411|year=1957|doi=10.2307/2406060|issue=4|publisher=Society for the Study of Evolution|jstor=2406060}}</ref> That finding was supported in a classic study of opossums by Austad;<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Austad SN|title=Retarded senescence in an insular population of Virginia opossums|journal=J. Zool. Lond.|volume=229|issue=4|pages=695–708|year=1993|doi=10.1111/j.1469-7998.1993.tb02665.x}}</ref> however, the opposite relationship was found in an equally prominent study of guppies by Reznick.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Reznick DN, Bryant MJ, Roff D, Ghalambor CK, Ghalambor DE|title=Effect of extrinsic mortality on the evolution of senescence in guppies|journal=Nature|volume=431|issue=7012|pages=1095–1099|date=October 2004|pmid=15510147|doi=10.1038/nature02936|s2cid=205210169|bibcode=2004Natur.431.1095R}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Mitteldorf J, Pepper JW|title=How can evolutionary theory accommodate recent empirical results on organismal senescence?|journal=Theory in Biosciences = Theorie in den Biowissenschaften|volume=126|issue=1|pages=3–8|date=August 2007|pmid=18087751|doi=10.1007/s12064-007-0001-0|s2cid=7305206}}</ref>

One prominent and very popular theory states that lifespan can be lengthened by a tight budget for food energy called ].<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Kirkwood TB|title=Evolution of ageing|journal=Nature|volume=270|issue=5635|pages=301–304|date=November 1977|pmid=593350|doi=10.1038/270301a0|s2cid=492012|bibcode=1977Natur.270..301K}}</ref> Caloric restriction observed in many animals (most notably mice and rats) shows a near doubling of life span from a very limited calorific intake. Support for the theory has been bolstered by several new studies linking lower ] to increased life expectancy.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Hulbert AJ, Pamplona R, Buffenstein R, Buttemer WA|title=Life and death: metabolic rate, membrane composition, and life span of animals|journal=Physiological Reviews|volume=87|issue=4|pages=1175–1213|date=October 2007|pmid=17928583|doi=10.1152/physrev.00047.2006|url=http://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/0c1b/ece43845df356bc2dda22dd27a82a8ef95e8.pdf|url-status=dead|s2cid=11903260|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190218133041/http://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/0c1b/ece43845df356bc2dda22dd27a82a8ef95e8.pdf|archive-date=18 February 2019}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Olshansky SJ, Rattan SI|title=What determines longevity: Metabolic rate or stability?|journal=Discovery Medicine|volume=5|issue=28|pages=359–362|date=August 2005|pmid=20704872|url=http://www.discoverymedicine.com/S-J-Olshansky/2009/07/25/what-determines-longevity-metabolic-rate-or-stability}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Aguilaniu H, Durieux J, Dillin A|title=Metabolism, ubiquinone synthesis, and longevity|journal=Genes & Development|volume=19|issue=20|pages=2399–2406|date=October 2005|pmid=16230529|doi=10.1101/gad.1366505|doi-access=free}}</ref> That is the key to why animals like giant ]s can live so long.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.immortalhumans.com/the-longevity-secret-for-tortoises-is-held-in-their-low-metabolism-rate/|title=The Longevity Secret for Tortoises Is Held in Their Low Metabolism Rate|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131112164840/http://www.immortalhumans.com/the-longevity-secret-for-tortoises-is-held-in-their-low-metabolism-rate/|archive-date=12 November 2013|url-status=dead}}</ref> Studies of humans with life spans of at least 100 have shown a link to decreased thyroid activity, resulting in their lowered metabolic rate.{{No source|date=January 2023}}

The ability of ] to perform ] after ] irradiation was measured in ], ], ], ], ], ] and ].<ref name="pmid4526202">{{cite journal|vauthors=Hart RW, Setlow RB|title=Correlation between deoxyribonucleic acid excision-repair and life-span in a number of mammalian species|journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America|volume=71|issue=6|pages=2169–73|date=June 1974|pmid=4526202|pmc=388412|doi=10.1073/pnas.71.6.2169|doi-access=free|bibcode=1974PNAS...71.2169H}}</ref> It was found that DNA repair capability increased systematically with species ]. Since this original study in 1974, at least 14 additional studies were performed on ]s to test this correlation.<ref name = Bernstein1991>{{cite book|vauthors=Bernstein C, Bernstein H|date=1991|title=Aging, Sex, and DNA Repair|publisher=Academic Press|location=San Diego, CA|pages=109–113}}</ref> In all, but two of these studies, lifespan correlated with DNA repair levels, suggesting that DNA repair capability contributes to life expectancy.<ref name = Bernstein1991/> See ].

In a broad survey of zoo animals, no relationship was found between investment of the animal in reproduction and its life span.<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Ricklefs RE, Cadena CD|title=Lifespan is unrelated to investment in reproduction in populations of mammals and birds in captivity|journal=Ecology Letters|volume=10|issue=10|pages=867–872|date=October 2007|pmid=17845285|doi=10.1111/j.1461-0248.2007.01085.x|bibcode=2007EcolL..10..867R}}</ref>

==Calculation==
{{further|Life table#The mathematics}}
]

In ], the probability of surviving from age <math>x</math> to age <math>x+n</math> is denoted <math>\,_np_x\!</math> and the probability of dying during age <math>x</math> (i.e. between ages <math>x</math> and <math>x+1</math>) is denoted <math>q_x\!</math> . For example, if 10% of a group of people alive at their 90th birthday die before their 91st birthday, the age-specific death probability at 90 would be 10%. This probability describes the ''likelihood'' of dying at that age, and is not the ''rate'' at which people of that age die.{{efn| Note the different units: a probability is unit-less, whereas a mortality rate has units (such as deaths per population per year).}} It can be shown that{{NumBlk|:|<math>{}_kp_x \, q_{x+k} = {}_k p_x - {}_{k+1}p_x</math>|{{EquationRef|1}}}}
The ''curtate future lifetime'', denoted <math>K(x)</math>, is a discrete random variable representing the remaining lifetime at age <math>x</math>, rounded down to whole years. Life expectancy, more technically called the ''curtate expected lifetime'' and denoted ''<math>\,e_x\!</math> ,{{efn|name=exsymbol}}'' is the ] of <math>K(x)</math>—that is to say, the expected number of whole years of life remaining, assuming survival to age <math>x</math>.<ref>{{cite web|vauthors=Kinney B|date=2019-05-01|title=Curtate Expectation of Life|url=https://infinityisreallybig.com/2019/05/01/curtate-expectation-of-life/|access-date=2022-11-18|website=Infinity is Really Big}}</ref> So,
{{NumBlk|:|<math>e_x = \operatorname{E} = \sum_{k=0}^\infty k\, \cdot \Pr(K(x)=k) = \sum_{k=0}^{\infty}k\, \,_kp_x \,\, q_{x+k}</math>|{{EquationRef|2}}}}
Substituting ({{EquationNote|1}}) into the sum and simplifying gives the final result<ref>{{cite book|title=Models for Quantifying Risk|edition=Third|vauthors=Cunningham R, Herzog T, London R|publisher=Actex|year=2008|isbn=978-1-56698-676-2}} page 92.</ref>
{{NumBlk|:|<math>e_x = \sum_{k=1}^\infty {} \, \,\, _k p_x</math>|{{EquationRef|3}}}}
If the assumption is made that, on average, people live a half year on the year of their death, the complete life expectancy at age <math>x</math> would be <math> e_x + 1/2</math>, which is denoted by e̊<sub>x</sub>, and is the intuitive definition of life expectancy.

By definition, life expectancy is an ]. It can also be calculated by integrating the survival curve from 0 to positive infinity (or equivalently to the maximum lifespan, sometimes called 'omega'). For an extinct or completed ] (all people born in the year 1850, for example), it can of course simply be calculated by averaging the ages at death. For cohorts with some survivors, it is estimated by using mortality experience in recent years. The estimates are called period cohort life expectancies.

The starting point for calculating life expectancy is the ]s of the population members. If a large amount of data is available, a ] can be created that allow the age-specific death rates to be simply taken as the mortality rates actually experienced at each age (the number of deaths divided by the number of years "exposed to risk" in each data cell). However, it is customary to apply smoothing to remove (as much as possible) the random statistical fluctuations from one year of age to the next. In the past, a very simple model used for this purpose was the ], but more sophisticated methods are now used.<ref name="pmid11824050">{{cite journal|vauthors=Anderson RN|title=A method for constructing complete annual U.S. life tables|journal=Vital and Health Statistics. Series 2, Data Evaluation and Methods Research|issue=129|pages=1–28|date=2000|pmid=11824050|url=https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_02/sr02_129.pdf}}</ref> The most common modern methods include:
* fitting a mathematical formula (such as the Gompertz function, or an extension of it) to the data.
* looking at an established ] derived from a larger population and making a simple adjustment to it (such as multiplying by a constant factor) to fit the data. (In cases of relatively small amounts of data.)
* looking at the mortality rates actually experienced at each age and applying a piecewise model (such as by ]) to fit the data. (In cases of relatively large amounts of data.)

The age-specific death rates are calculated separately for separate groups of data that are believed to have different mortality rates (such as males and females, or smokers and non-smokers) and are then used to calculate a ] from which one can calculate the probability of surviving to each age. While the data required are easily identified in the case of humans, the computation of life expectancy of industrial products and wild animals involves more indirect techniques. The life expectancy and demography of wild animals are often estimated by capturing, marking, and recapturing them.<ref>{{cite book|vauthors=Young LJ, Young JH|author-link1=Linda J. Young|date=1998|title=Statistical ecology: a population perspective.|location=Boston|publisher=Kluwer Academic Publishers|page=310|isbn=978-0-412-04711-4}}</ref> The life of a product, more often termed ], is also computed using similar methods. In the case of long-lived components, such as those used in critical applications (e.g. aircraft), methods like ] are used to model the life expectancy of a component.<ref name="machine" />

The life expectancy statistic is usually based on past mortality experience and assumes that the same age-specific mortality rates will continue. Thus, such life expectancy figures need to be adjusted for temporal trends before calculating how long a currently living individual of a particular age is expected to live. Period life expectancy remains a commonly used statistic to summarize the current health status of a population. However, for some purposes, such as pensions calculations, it is usual to adjust the life table used by assuming that age-specific death rates will continue to decrease over the years, as they have usually done in the past. That is often done by simply extrapolating past trends, but some models exist to account for the evolution of mortality, like the ].<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Lee RD, Carter LR|title=Modeling and forecasting US mortality.|journal=Journal of the American Statistical Association|date=September 1992|volume=87|issue=419|pages=659–671|doi=10.1080/01621459.1992.10475265}}</ref>

As discussed above, on an individual basis, some factors correlate with longer life. Factors that are associated with variations in life expectancy include family history, marital status, economic status, physique, exercise, diet, drug use (including smoking and alcohol consumption), disposition, education, environment, sleep, climate, and health care.<ref name="Santrock"/>

==Healthy life expectancy==
To assess the quality of these additional years of life, 'healthy life expectancy' has been calculated for the last 30 years. Since 2001, the World Health Organization has published statistics called '''Healthy life expectancy''' ('''HALE'''), defined as the average number of years that a person can expect to live in "full health" excluding the years lived in less than full health due to disease and/or injury.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.who.int/data/gho/indicator-metadata-registry/imr-details/healthy-life-expectancy-(hale)-at-60-(years)|title=Healthy life expectancy (HALE) at 60 (years)|publisher=World Health Organization}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.who.int/healthinfo/statistics/indhale/en/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120704092005/http://www.who.int/healthinfo/statistics/indhale/en/|url-status=dead|archive-date=4 July 2012|title=Health Status Statistics: Mortality|publisher=World Health Organization}}</ref> Since 2004, ] publishes annual statistics called ] (HLY) based on reported activity limitations. The United States uses similar indicators in the framework of the national health promotion and disease prevention plan "]". More and more countries are using health expectancy indicators to monitor the health of their population.

]

The long-standing ] led in the 2010s to a more promising focus on increasing HALE, also known as a person's "healthspan". Besides the benefits of keeping people healthier longer, a goal is to reduce health-care expenses on the many diseases associated with ]. Approaches being explored include ], ], and ] drugs.<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24232270-100-anti-ageing-drugs-are-coming-that-could-keep-you-healthier-for-longer/|vauthors=Lawton G|title=Anti-ageing drugs are coming that could keep you healthier for longer|date=2019-04-24|website=]|access-date=2019-05-02}}</ref>

==Forecasting==
Forecasting life expectancy and mortality form an important subdivision of ]. Future trends in life expectancy have huge implications for old-age support programs (like ] and ]) since the cash flow in these systems depends on the number of recipients who are still living (along with the rate of return on the investments or the tax rate in ] systems). With longer life expectancies, the systems see increased cash outflow; if the systems underestimate increases in life-expectancies, they will be unprepared for the large payments that will occur, as humans live longer and longer.

Life expectancy forecasting is usually based on one of two different approaches:

# Forecasting the life expectancy directly, generally using ] or other time-series extrapolation procedures. This has the advantage of simplicity, but it cannot account for changes in mortality at specific ages, and the forecast number cannot be used to derive other ] results. Analyses and forecasts using this approach can be done with any common statistical/mathematical software package, like ], ], ], ], ], or ].
# Forecasting age-specific ] and computing the life expectancy from the results with life table methods. This is usually more complex than simply forecasting life expectancy because the analyst must deal with correlated age-specific mortality rates, but it seems to be more robust than simple one-dimensional ] approaches. It also yields a set of age-specific rates that may be used to derive other measures, such as survival curves or life expectancies at different ages. The most important approach in this group is the ],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.soa.org/library/journals/north-american-actuarial-journal/2000/january/naaj0001_5.pdf|title=The Lee-Carter Method for Forecasting Mortality, with Various Extensions and Applications – SOA|publisher=SOA|access-date=9 April 2018|archive-date=7 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190307054148/https://www.soa.org/library/journals/north-american-actuarial-journal/2000/january/naaj0001_5.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref> which uses the ] on a set of transformed age-specific mortality rates to reduce their dimensionality to a single time series, forecasts that time series, and then recovers a full set of age-specific mortality rates from that forecasted value. The software includes Professor ]'s and .

==Policy uses==
Life expectancy is one of the factors in measuring the ] (HDI) of each nation along with adult literacy, education, and standard of living.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://hdrstats.undp.org/indicators/6.html|title=International Human Development Indicators—UNDP|publisher=Hdrstats.undp.org|access-date=4 November 2010|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090420030845/http://hdrstats.undp.org/indicators/6.html|archive-date=20 April 2009}}</ref>

Life expectancy is used in describing the ] of an area. It is also used for an individual when the value of a life settlement is determined a life insurance policy is sold for a cash asset.{{Clarify|reason=Hard to understand due to sentence structure and wording.|date=November 2022}}

Disparities in life expectancy are often cited as demonstrating the need for better medical care or increased social support. A strongly associated indirect measure is ]. For the top 21 industrialized countries, if each person is counted equally, life expectancy is lower in more unequal countries (r = −0.907).<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=De Vogli R, Mistry R, Gnesotto R, Cornia GA|title=Has the relation between income inequality and life expectancy disappeared? Evidence from Italy and top industrialised countries|journal=Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health|volume=59|issue=2|pages=158–162|date=February 2005|pmid=15650149|pmc=1733006|doi=10.1136/jech.2004.020651|doi-access=free}}</ref> There is a similar relationship among states in the U.S. (r = −0.620).<ref>{{cite journal|vauthors=Kaplan GA, Pamuk ER, Lynch JW, Cohen RD, Balfour JL|title=Inequality in income and mortality in the United States: analysis of mortality and potential pathways|journal=The BMJ|volume=312|issue=7037|pages=999–1003|date=April 1996|pmid=8616393|pmc=2350835|doi=10.1136/bmj.312.7037.999|doi-access=free}}</ref>

==Life expectancy vs. other measures of longevity==
] planning.<ref name="SocSecPeriodLifeExpectancy_2020">{{cite web|date=2020|title=Actuarial Life Table|url=https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230708231105/https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html|archive-date=8 July 2023|publisher=U.S. Social Security Administration Office of Chief Actuary}}</ref>]]
Life expectancy may be confused with the average age an adult could expect to live, creating the misunderstanding that an adult's lifespan would be unlikely to exceed their life expectancy at birth. This is not the case, as life expectancy is an average of the lifespans of all individuals, including those who die before adulthood. One may compare the life expectancy of the period after childhood to estimate also the life expectancy of an adult.<ref name="Wanjek 2003"/>

As a measure of the years of life remaining, life expectancy decreases with age after initially rising in early childhood, but the average age to which a person is likely to live increases as they survive to successive higher ages.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0005140.html|title=Life Expectancy by Age, 1850–2011|website=InfoPlease}}</ref> In the table above, the estimated modern hunter-gatherer average expectation of life at birth of 33 years (often considered an upper-bound for Paleolithic populations) equates to a life expectancy at 15 of 39 years, so that those surviving to age 15 will on average die at 54.

In England in the 13th–19th centuries with life expectancy at birth rising from perhaps 25 years to over 40, expectation of life at age 30 has been estimated at 20–30 years,<ref>{{cite web|vauthors=Khan-ad-Din FM, Caidan Pentathlon M|title=Old Age, Height and Nutrition: Common Misconceptions About Medieval England|url=http://sirguillaume.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Old_Age-Height-Nutrition.pdf}}</ref> giving an average age at death of about 50–60 for those (a minority at the start of the period but two-thirds at its end) surviving beyond their twenties.

]

The table above gives the life expectancy at birth among 13th-century English nobles as 30–33, but having surviving to the age of 21, a male member of the English aristocracy could expect to live:
* 1200–1300: to age 64
* 1300–1400: to age 45 (because of the ])
* 1400–1500: to age 69
* 1500–1550: to age 71<ref name="Expectations of Life" />

A further concept is that of modal age at death, the single age when deaths among a population are more numerous than at any other age. In all pre-modern societies the most common age at death is the first year of life: it is only as infant mortality falls below around 33–34 per thousand (roughly a tenth of estimated ancient and medieval levels) that deaths in a later year of life (usually around age 80) become more numerous. While the most common age of death in adulthood among modern hunter-gatherers (often taken as a guide to the likely most favourable Paleolithic demographic experience) is estimated to average 72 years,<ref name="Gurven, Kaplan 2007">{{citation|vauthors=Gurven M, Kaplan H|title=Longevity Among Hunter- Gatherers: A Cross-Cultural Examination|journal=Population and Development Review|volume=33|issue=2|pages=321–365|year=2007|doi=10.1111/j.1728-4457.2007.00171.x}}</ref> the number dying at that age is dwarfed by those (over a fifth of all infants) dying in the first year of life, and only around a quarter usually survive to the higher age.

] is an individual-specific concept, and therefore is an upper bound rather than an average.<ref name="Wanjek 2003">{{citation|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oIJ5TKh7mPgC&q=%22this+is+one+of+the+biggest+misconceptions+about+old+age%22&pg=PA70|author-link=Christopher Wanjek|vauthors=Wanjek C|title=Bad Medicine: Misconceptions and Misuses Revealed, from Distance Healing to Vitamin O|publisher=Wiley|year=2002|pages=70–71|isbn=978-0-471-43499-3|postscript=.}}</ref> Science author ] writes, "as the human race increased its life span? Not at all. This is one of the biggest misconceptions about old age: we are not living any longer." The maximum life span, or oldest age a human can live, may be constant.<ref name="Wanjek 2003" /> Further, there are many examples of people living significantly longer than the average life expectancy of their time period, such as ] (71), ] (105), ] (88), and ] (90).<ref name="Wanjek 2003" />

However, anthropologist ] criticizes the popular conflation of life span (life expectancy) and ] when popular science writers falsely imply that the average adult human does not live longer than their ancestors. He writes, "ge-specific mortality rates have declined across the adult lifespan. A smaller fraction of adults die at 20, at 30, at 40, at 50, and so on across the lifespan. As a result, we live longer on average... In every way we can measure, human lifespans are longer today than in the immediate past, and longer today than they were 2000 years ago... age-specific mortality rates in adults really have reduced substantially."<ref name="Hawks 2009">{{citation|url=http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/life_history/age-specific-mortality-lifespan-bad-science-2009.html|author-link=John D. Hawks|vauthors=Hawks J|title=Human lifespans have not been constant for the last 2000 years|year=2009|postscript=.}}</ref>

== See also ==
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==References== ==Notes==
{{notelist|refs=
<!--<nowiki>
{{efn |name=exsymbol |In standard actuarial notation, ''e{{sub|x}}'' refers to the expected future lifetime of ''(x)'' in whole years, while ''eͦ{{sub|x}}'' (with a ring above the ''e'') denotes the complete expected future lifetime of ''(x)'', including the fraction.}}
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===Notes===
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===Further reading=== == References ==
{{Reflist}}
* ] & ] (1991), ''The Biology of Life Span: A Quantitative Approach''. New York: Harwood Academic Publisher, ISBN 3-7186-4983-7


== Further reading ==
==External links==
{{refbegin}}
{{commons|Life expectancy}}
* {{cite book|vauthors=Gavrilov LA, Gavrilova NS|author-link1=Leonid A. Gavrilov|date=1991|title=The Biology of Life Span: A Quantitative Approach|location=New York|publisher=Harwood Academic Publisher|isbn=978-3-7186-4983-9}}
* (based on the Austrian generation and annuity valuation life tables)
* {{cite book|vauthors=Kochanek KD, Arias E, Anderson RN|date=2013|url=https://purl.fdlp.gov/GPO/gpo41789|title=How Did Cause of Death Contribute to Racial Differences in Life Expectancy in the United States in 2010?|location=Hyattsville, Md.|publisher=], ], ]}}
* from the CIA's World Factbook.
{{refend}}
* from the USA Centers for Disease Controls and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics.
* from the University of Texas.
* from Western Washington University.
* from The human Mortality Database.
* Animal lifespans: from Tesarta Online (Internet Archive); from Dr Bob's All Creatures Site.
* ] (2007)
*
* (video) from TED Conference


== External links ==
{{Commons category|Life expectancy}}
*
* —Visualizations of how life expectancy around the world has changed historically (by ]). Includes life expectancy for different age groups. Charts for all countries, world maps, and links to more data sources.
* {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141003130501/http://www.helpage.org/global-agewatch/population-ageing-data/ |date=3 October 2014 }}
* {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181229134543/https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2102rank.html |date=29 December 2018 }} from the CIA's World Factbook.
* from the US Centers for Disease Controls and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics.
* from the University of Texas.
* Animal lifespans: from Tesarta Online (Internet Archive); from Dr. Bob's All Creatures Site.

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Latest revision as of 02:46, 17 December 2024

Measure of average lifespan in a given population This article is about normal lifespan. For the novel, see Life Expectancy (novel). "Human lifespan" redirects here. For the lifespan of a person in stages, see Maturation.
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Life expectancy and healthy life expectancy in various countries of the world in 2019, according to WHO
Map of the life expectancy at birth in the world in 2023 (UN estimate, smooth palette)
  ⩾ 85   82.5   80   77.5   75   72.5   70   67.5   65   62.5   60   57.5   55   ⩽ 53
Life expectancy at age 15 years
  70   67.5   65   62.5   60   57.5   55   52.5   50   47.5
Life expectancy at age 65 years
  22.5   20   17.5   15   12.5
Life expectancy at age 80 years
  10   7.5   5
Life expectancy development in some big countries of the world since 1960
Life expectancy at birth, measured by region, between 1950 and 2050
Life expectancy by world region, from 1770 to 2018

Human life expectancy is a statistical measure of the estimate of the average remaining years of life at a given age. The most commonly used measure is life expectancy at birth (LEB, or in demographic notation e0, where ex denotes the average life remaining at age x). This can be defined in two ways. Cohort LEB is the mean length of life of a birth cohort (in this case, all individuals born in a given year) and can be computed only for cohorts born so long ago that all their members have died. Period LEB is the mean length of life of a hypothetical cohort assumed to be exposed, from birth through death, to the mortality rates observed at a given year. National LEB figures reported by national agencies and international organizations for human populations are estimates of period LEB.

Human remains from the early Bronze Age indicate an LEB of 24. In 2019, world LEB was 73.3. A combination of high infant mortality and deaths in young adulthood from accidents, epidemics, plagues, wars, and childbirth, before modern medicine was widely available, significantly lowers LEB. For example, a society with a LEB of 40 would have relatively few people dying at exactly 40: most will die before 30 or after 55. In populations with high infant mortality rates, LEB is highly sensitive to the rate of death in the first few years of life. Because of this sensitivity, LEB can be grossly misinterpreted, leading to the belief that a population with a low LEB would have a small proportion of older people. A different measure, such as life expectancy at age 5 (e5), can be used to exclude the effect of infant mortality to provide a simple measure of overall mortality rates other than in early childhood. For instance, in a society with a life expectancy of 30, it may nevertheless be common to have a 40-year remaining timespan at age 5 (but not a 60-year one).

Aggregate population measures—such as the proportion of the population in various age groups—are also used alongside individual-based measures—such as formal life expectancy—when analyzing population structure and dynamics. Pre-modern societies had universally higher mortality rates and lower life expectancies at every age for both males and females.

Life expectancy, longevity, and maximum lifespan are not synonymous. Longevity refers to the relatively long lifespan of some members of a population. Maximum lifespan is the age at death for the longest-lived individual of a species. Mathematically, life expectancy is denoted e x {\displaystyle e_{x}} and is the mean number of years of life remaining at a given age x {\displaystyle x} , with a particular mortality. Because life expectancy is an average, a particular person may die many years before or after the expected survival.

Life expectancy is also used in plant or animal ecology, and in life tables (also known as actuarial tables). The concept of life expectancy may also be used in the context of manufactured objects, though the related term shelf life is commonly used for consumer products, and the terms "mean time to breakdown" and "mean time between failures" are used in engineering.

History

The earliest documented work on life expectancy was done in the 1660s by John Graunt, Christiaan Huygens, and Lodewijck Huygens.

Human patterns

Maximum

The longest verified lifespan for any human is that of Frenchwoman Jeanne Calment, who is verified as having lived to age 122 years, 164 days, between 21 February 1875 and 4 August 1997. This is referred to as the "maximum life span", which is the upper boundary of life, the maximum number of years any human is known to have lived. According to a study by biologists Bryan G. Hughes and Siegfried Hekimi, there is no evidence for limit on human lifespan. However, this view has been questioned on the basis of error patterns. A theoretical study shows that the maximum life expectancy at birth is limited by the human life characteristic value δ, which is around 104 years.

Variation over time

Further information: Longevity and List of countries by past life expectancy

The following information is derived from the 1961 Encyclopædia Britannica and other sources, some with questionable accuracy. Unless otherwise stated, it represents estimates of the life expectancies of the world population as a whole. In many instances, life expectancy varied considerably according to class and gender.

Life expectancy at birth takes account of infant mortality and child mortality but not prenatal mortality.

Era Life expectancy at birth in years Notes
Paleolithic 22–33 With modern hunter-gatherer populations' estimated average life expectancy at birth of 33 years, life expectancy for the 60% reaching age 15 averages 39 remaining years.
Neolithic 20–33 Based on Early Neolithic data, life expectancy at age 15 would be 28–33 years.
Bronze Age and Iron Age 26 Based on Early and Middle Bronze Age data, life expectancy at age 15 would be 28–36 years.
Classical Greece 25–28 Based on Athens Agora and Corinth data, life expectancy at age 15 would be 37–41 years. Most Greeks and Romans died young. About half of all children died before adolescence. Those who survived to the age of 30 had a reasonable chance of reaching 50 or 60. The truly elderly, however, were rare. Because so many died in childhood, life expectancy at birth was probably between 20 and 30 years.
Ancient Rome 20–33

Data is lacking, but computer models provide the estimate. If a person survived to age 20, they could expect to live around 30 years more. Life expectancy was probably slightly longer for women than men.

Life expectancy at age 1 reached 34–41 remaining years for the 67–75% surviving the first year. For the 55-65% surviving to age 5, remaining life expectancy reached around 40–45, while the ~50% reaching age 10 could expect another 40 years of life. Average remaining years fell to 33–39 at age 15; ~20 at age 40; 14–18 at age 50; ~10–12 at age 60; and ~6–7 at age 70.

Wang clan of China, 1st century AD – 1749 35 Life expectancy at age 1 reached 47 years for the 72% surviving the first year.
Early Middle Ages (Europe, from the late 5th or early 6th century to the 10th century) 30–35 A Gaulish boy surviving to age 20 might expect to live 25 more years, while a woman at age 20 could normally expect about 17 more years. Anyone who survived until 40 had a good chance of another 15 to 20 years.
Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica 20–40 Expectation of life at birth 13–36 years for various Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican cultures, most of the results lying in the range 24–32 years. Aztec life expectancy 41.2 years for men and 42.1 for women.
Late medieval English peerage 30–33 Around a third of infants died in their first year. Life expectancy at age 10 reached 32.2 remaining years, and for those who survived to 25, the remaining life expectancy was 23.3 years. Such estimates reflected the life expectancy of adult males from the higher ranks of English society in the Middle Ages, and were similar to that computed for monks of the Christ Church in Canterbury during the 15th century. At age 21, life expectancy of an aristocrat was an additional 43 years.
Early modern Britain (16th – 18th century) 33–40 18th-century male life expectancy at birth was 34 years. Female expectation of remaining years at age 15 rose from ~33 years around the 15th-16th centuries to ~42 in the 18th century.
18th-century England 25–40 For most of the century it ranged from 35 to 40; but in the 1720s it dipped as low as 25. During the second half of the century it averaged 37, while for the elite it passed 40 and approached 50.
Pre-Champlain Canadian Maritimes 60 Samuel de Champlain wrote that in his visits to Mi'kmaq and Huron communities, he met people over 100 years old. Daniel Paul attributes the incredible lifespan in the region to low stress and a healthy diet of lean meats, diverse vegetables, and legumes.
18th-century Prussia 24.7 For males.
18th-century France 27.5–30 For males: 24.8 years in 1740–1749, 27.9 years in 1750–1759, 33.9 years in 1800–1809.
18th-century American colonies 28 Massachusetts colonists who reached the age of 50 could expect to live until 71, and those who were still alive at 60 could expect to reach 75.
Beginning of the 19th century ~29 At the beginning of the 19th century, no country in the world had a life expectancy at birth longer than 40 years, England, Belgium and the Netherlands came closest, each reaching 40 years by the 1840s (by which time they had been surpassed by Norway, Sweden and Denmark). India's life expectancy is estimated at ~25 years, while Europe averaged ~33 years.
Early 19th-century England 40 Remaining years of life averaged ~45–47 for the 84% who survived the first year. Life expectancy fell to ~40 years at age 20, then ~20 years at age 50 and ~10 years at age 70. For a 15-year-old girl it was ~40–45. For the upper-class, LEB rose from ~45 to 50.

Only half of the people born in the early 19th century made it past their 50th birthday. In contrast, 97% of the people born in 21st century England and Wales can expect to live longer than 50 years.

19th-century British India 25.4
19th-century world average 28.5–32 Over the course of the century: Europe rose from ~33 to 43, the Americas from ~35 to 41, Oceania ~35 to 48, Asia ~28, Africa 26. In 1820s France, LEB was ~38, and for the 80% that survived, it rose to ~47. For Moscow serfs, LEB was ~34, and for the 66% that survived, it rose to ~36. Western Europe in 1830 was ~33 years, while for the people of Hau-Lou in China, it was ~40. The LEB for a 10-year-old in Sweden rose from ~44 to ~54.
1900 world average 31–32 Around 48 years in Oceania, 43 in Europe, and 41 in the Americas. Around 47 in the U.S. and around 48 for 15-year-old girls in England.
1950 world average 45.7–48 Around 60 years in Europe, North America, Oceania, Japan, and parts of South America; but only 41 in Asia and 36 in Africa. Norway led with 72, while in Mali it was merely 26.
2019–2020 world average 72.6–73.2
  • Females: 75.6 years
  • Males: 70.8 years
  • Range: ~54 (Central African Republic) – 85.3 (Hong Kong)

English life expectancy at birth averaged about 36 years in the 17th and 18th centuries, one of the highest levels in the world although infant and child mortality remained higher than in later periods. Life expectancy was under 25 years in the early Colony of Virginia, and in seventeenth-century New England, about 40% died before reaching adulthood. During the Industrial Revolution, the life expectancy of children increased dramatically. Recorded deaths among children under the age of 5 years fell in London from 74.5% of the recorded births in 1730–49 to 31.8% in 1810–29, though this overstates mortality and its fall because of net immigration (hence more dying in the metropolis than were born there) and incomplete registration (particularly of births, and especially in the earlier period). English life expectancy at birth reached 41 years in the 1840s, 43 in the 1870s and 46 in the 1890s, though infant mortality remained at around 150 per thousand throughout this period.

Life expectancy in 1800, 1950, and 2015 – visualization by Our World in Data

Public health measures are credited with much of the recent increase in life expectancy. During the 20th century, despite a brief drop due to the 1918 flu pandemic, the average lifespan in the United States increased by more than 30 years, of which 25 years can be attributed to advances in public health.

Regional variations

Further information: List of countries by life expectancy

There are great variations in life expectancy between different parts of the world, mostly caused by differences in public health, medical care, and diet.

Human beings are expected to live on average 60 years in Eswatini and 82.6 years in Japan. An analysis published in 2011 in The Lancet attributes Japanese life expectancy to equal opportunities, excellent public health, and a healthy diet.

The World Health Organization announced that the COVID-19 pandemic reversed the trend of steady gain in life expectancy at birth. The pandemic wiped out nearly a decade of progress in improving life expectancy.

Africa

Graphs of life expectancy at birth for some sub-Saharan countries showing the fall in the 1990s primarily due to the HIV pandemic

During the last 200 years, African countries have generally not had the same improvements in mortality rates that have been enjoyed by countries in Asia, Latin America, and Europe. This is most apparent by the impact of AIDS on many African countries. According to projections made by the United Nations in 2002, the life expectancy at birth for 2010–2015 (if HIV/AIDS did not exist) would have been:

  • 70.7 years instead of 31.6 years, Botswana
  • 69.9 years instead of 41.5 years, South Africa
  • 70.5 years instead of 31.8 years, Zimbabwe

Eastern Europe

On average, eastern Europeans tend to live shorter lives than their western counterparts. For example, Spaniards from Madrid can expect to live to 85, but Bulgarians from the region of Severozapaden are predicted to live just past their 73rd birthday. This is in large part due to poor health habits, such as heavy smoking and high alcoholism in the region, and environmental actors, such as high air pollution.

United States

Life expectancy from 1990 to 2021 in the US, UK, Netherlands, and Austria

In 2022, the life expectancy was 77.5 in the United States, a decline from 2014, but an increase from 2021. In what has been described as a "life expectancy crisis", there were a total of 13 million "missing Americans" from 1980 to 2021, deaths that would have been averted if it had the standard mortality rate of "wealthy nations".

The annual number of "missing Americans" has been increasing, with 622,534 in 2019 alone. Most excess deaths in the United States can largely be attributed to increasing obesity, alcoholism, drug overdoses, car accidents, suicides, and murders, with poor sleep, unhealthy diets, and loneliness being linked to most of them.

Black Americans have generally shorter life expectancies than their White American counterparts. For example, white Americans in 2010 are expected to live until age 78.9, but black Americans only until age 75.1. This 3.8-year gap, however, is the lowest it has been since 1975 at the latest, the greatest difference being 7.1 years in 1993. In contrast, Asian American women live the longest of all ethnic and gender groups in the United States, with a life expectancy of 85.8 years. The life expectancy of Hispanic Americans is 81.2 years.

Japan

In 2023, the life expectancy was 84.5 in Japan, 4.2 years above the OECD average, and one of the highest in the world. Japan's high life expectancy can largely be explained by their healthy diets, which are low on salt, fat, and red meat. For these reasons, Japan has a low obesity rate, and ultimately low mortality from heart disease and cancers.

In cities

Cities also experience a wide range of life expectancy based on neighborhood breakdowns. This is largely due to economic clustering and poverty conditions that tend to associate based on geographic location. Multi-generational poverty found in struggling neighborhoods also contributes. In American cities such as Cincinnati, the life expectancy gap between low income and high-income neighborhoods touches 20 years.

Economic circumstances

See also: Preston curve
Life expectancy vs healthcare spending of rich OECD countries. US average of $10,447 in 2018.

Economic circumstances also affect life expectancy. For example, in the United Kingdom, life expectancy in the wealthiest and richest areas is several years higher than in the poorest areas. This may reflect factors such as diet and lifestyle, as well as access to medical care. It may also reflect a selective effect: people with chronic life-threatening illnesses are less likely to become wealthy or to reside in affluent areas. In Glasgow, the disparity is amongst the highest in the world: life expectancy for males in the heavily deprived Calton area stands at 54, which is 28 years less than in the affluent area of Lenzie, which is only 8 km (5.0 mi) away.

A 2013 study found a pronounced relationship between economic inequality and life expectancy. However, in contrast, a study by José A. Tapia Granados and Ana Diez Roux at the University of Michigan found that life expectancy actually increased during the Great Depression, and during recessions and depressions in general. The authors suggest that when people are working at a more extreme degree during prosperous economic times, they undergo more stress, exposure to pollution, and the likelihood of injury among other longevity-limiting factors.

Life expectancy is also likely to be affected by exposure to high levels of highway air pollution or industrial air pollution. This is one way that occupation can have a major effect on life expectancy. Coal miners (and in prior generations, asbestos cutters) often have lower life expectancies than average. Other factors affecting an individual's life expectancy are genetic disorders, drug use, tobacco smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, obesity, access to health care, diet, and exercise.

Sex differences

Life expectancy and healthy life expectancy by sex in 2019
Pink: Countries where female life expectancy at birth is higher than males. Blue: A few countries in southern Africa where females have shorter lives due to AIDS. (2015)
"Gender Die Gap": global female life expectancy gap at birth for countries and territories as defined by WHO for 2019. Open the original svg-file and hover over a bubble to show its data. The square of the bubbles is proportional to country population based on estimation of the UN.

In the present, female human life expectancy is greater than that of males, despite females having higher morbidity rates (see health survival paradox). There are many potential reasons for this. Traditional arguments tend to favor sociology-environmental factors: historically, men have generally consumed more tobacco, alcohol, and drugs than women in most societies, and are more likely to die from many associated diseases such as lung cancer, tuberculosis, and cirrhosis of the liver. Men are also more likely to die from injuries, whether unintentional (such as occupational, war, or car wrecks) or intentional (suicide). Men are also more likely to die from most of the leading causes of death (some already stated above) than women. Some of these in the United States include cancer of the respiratory system, motor vehicle accidents, suicide, cirrhosis of the liver, emphysema, prostate cancer, and coronary heart disease. These far outweigh the female mortality rate from breast cancer and cervical cancer. In the past, mortality rates for females in child-bearing age groups were higher than for males at the same age.

A paper from 2015 found that female foetuses have a higher mortality rate than male foetuses. This finding contradicts papers dating from 2002 and earlier that attribute the male sex to higher in-utero mortality rates. Among the smallest premature babies (those under 2 pounds (910 grams)), females have a higher survival rate. At the other extreme, about 90% of individuals aged 110 are female. The difference in life expectancy between men and women in the United States dropped from 7.8 years in 1979 to 5.3 years in 2005, with women expected to live to age 80.1 in 2005. Data from the United Kingdom shows the gap in life expectancy between men and women decreasing in later life. This may be attributable to the effects of infant mortality and young adult death rates.

Some argue that shorter male life expectancy is merely another manifestation of the general rule, seen in all mammal species, that larger-sized individuals within a species tend, on average, to have shorter lives. This biological difference occurs because women have more resistance to infections and degenerative diseases.

In her extensive review of the existing literature, Kalben concluded that the fact that women live longer than men was observed at least as far back as 1750 and that, with relatively equal treatment, today males in all parts of the world experience greater mortality than females. However, Kalben's study was restricted to data in Western Europe alone, where the demographic transition occurred relatively early. United Nations statistics from mid-twentieth century onward, show that in all parts of the world, females have a higher life expectancy at age 60 than males. Of 72 selected causes of death, only 6 yielded greater female than male age-adjusted death rates in 1998 in the United States. Except for birds, for almost all of the animal species studied, males have higher mortality than females. Evidence suggests that the sex mortality differential in people is due to both biological/genetic and environmental/behavioral risk and protective factors.

One recent suggestion is that mitochondrial mutations which shorten lifespan continue to be expressed in males (but less so in females) because mitochondria are inherited only through the mother. By contrast, natural selection weeds out mitochondria that reduce female survival; therefore, such mitochondria are less likely to be passed on to the next generation. This thus suggests that females tend to live longer than males. The authors claim that this is a partial explanation.

Another explanation is the unguarded X hypothesis. According to this hypothesis, one reason for why the average lifespan of males is not as long as that of females––by 18% on average, according to the study––is that they have a Y chromosome which cannot protect an individual from harmful genes expressed on the X chromosome, while a duplicate X chromosome, as present in female organisms, can ensure harmful genes are not expressed.

In developed countries, starting around 1880, death rates decreased faster among women, leading to differences in mortality rates between males and females. Before 1880, death rates were the same. In people born after 1900, the death rate of 50- to 70-year-old men was double that of women of the same age. Men may be more vulnerable to cardiovascular disease than women, but this susceptibility was evident only after deaths from other causes, such as infections, started to decline. Most of the difference in life expectancy between the sexes is accounted for by differences in the rate of death by cardiovascular diseases among persons aged 50–70.

Genetics

Further information: Genetics of aging

The heritability of lifespan is estimated to be less than 10%, meaning the majority of variation in lifespan is attributable due to differences in environment rather than genetic variation. However, researchers have identified regions of the genome which can influence the length of life and the number of years lived in good health. For example, a genome-wide association study of 1 million lifespans found 12 genetic loci which influenced lifespan by modifying susceptibility to cardiovascular and smoking-related disease. The locus with the largest effect is APOE. Carriers of the APOE ε4 allele live approximately one year less than average (per copy of the ε4 allele), mainly due to increased risk of Alzheimer's disease.

"Healthspan, parental lifespan, and longevity are highly genetically correlated."

In July 2020, scientists identified 10 genomic loci with consistent effects across multiple lifespan-related traits, including healthspan, lifespan, and longevity. The genes affected by variation in these loci highlighted haem metabolism as a promising candidate for further research within the field. This study suggests that high levels of iron in the blood likely reduce, and genes involved in metabolising iron likely increase healthy years of life in humans.

A follow-up study which investigated the genetics of frailty and self-rated health in addition to healthspan, lifespan, and longevity also highlighted haem metabolism as an important pathway, and found genetic variants which lower blood protein levels of LPA and VCAM1 were associated with increased healthy lifespan.

Centenarians

Main article: Centenarian

In developed countries, the number of centenarians is increasing at approximately 5.5% per year, which means doubling the centenarian population every 13 years, pushing it from some 455,000 in 2009 to 4.1 million in 2050. Japan is the country with the highest ratio of centenarians (347 for every 1 million inhabitants in September 2010). Shimane Prefecture had an estimated 743 centenarians per million inhabitants.

In the United States, the number of centenarians grew from 32,194 in 1980 to 71,944 in November 2010 (232 centenarians per million inhabitants).

Mental illness

Mental illness is reported to occur in approximately 18% of the average American population.

Life expectancy in the seriously mentally ill is much shorter than the general population.

The mentally ill have been shown to have a 10- to 25-year reduction in life expectancy. Generally, the reduction of lifespan in the mentally ill population compared to the mentally stable population has been studied and documented.

The greater mortality of people with mental disorders may be due to death from injury, from co-morbid conditions, or medication side effects. For instance, psychiatric medications can increase the risk of developing diabetes. It has been shown that the psychiatric medication olanzapine can increase risk of developing agranulocytosis, among other comorbidities. Psychiatric medicines also affect the gastrointestinal tract; the mentally ill have a four times risk of gastrointestinal disease.

As of 2020 and the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers have found an increased risk of death in the mentally ill.

Other illnesses

The life expectancy of people with diabetes, which is 9.3% of the U.S. population, is reduced by roughly 10–20 years. People over 60 years old with Alzheimer's disease have about a 50% life expectancy of 3–10 years. Other demographics that tend to have a lower life expectancy than average include transplant recipients and the obese.

Education

Education on all levels has been shown to be strongly associated with increased life expectancy. This association may be due partly to higher income, which can lead to increased life expectancy. Despite the association, among identical twin pairs with different education levels, there is only weak evidence of a relationship between educational attainment and adult mortality.

According to a paper from 2015, the mortality rate for the Caucasian population in the United States from 1993 to 2001 is four times higher for those who did not complete high school compared to those who have at least 16 years of education. In fact, within the U.S. adult population, people with less than a high school education have the shortest life expectancies.

Preschool education also plays a large role in life expectancy. It was found that high-quality early-stage childhood education had positive effects on health. Researchers discovered this by analyzing the results of the Carolina Abecedarian Project, finding that the disadvantaged children who were randomly assigned to treatment had lower instances of risk factors for cardiovascular and metabolic diseases in their mid-30s.

Evolution and aging rate

Main article: Life history theory

Various species of plants and animals, including humans, have different lifespans. Evolutionary theory states that organisms which—by virtue of their defenses or lifestyle—live for long periods and avoid accidents, disease, predation, etc. are likely to have genes that code for slow aging, which often translates to good cellular repair. One theory is that if predation or accidental deaths prevent most individuals from living to an old age, there will be less natural selection to increase the intrinsic life span. That finding was supported in a classic study of opossums by Austad; however, the opposite relationship was found in an equally prominent study of guppies by Reznick.

One prominent and very popular theory states that lifespan can be lengthened by a tight budget for food energy called caloric restriction. Caloric restriction observed in many animals (most notably mice and rats) shows a near doubling of life span from a very limited calorific intake. Support for the theory has been bolstered by several new studies linking lower basal metabolic rate to increased life expectancy. That is the key to why animals like giant tortoises can live so long. Studies of humans with life spans of at least 100 have shown a link to decreased thyroid activity, resulting in their lowered metabolic rate.

The ability of skin fibroblasts to perform DNA repair after UV irradiation was measured in shrew, mouse, rat, hamster, cow, elephant and human. It was found that DNA repair capability increased systematically with species life span. Since this original study in 1974, at least 14 additional studies were performed on mammals to test this correlation. In all, but two of these studies, lifespan correlated with DNA repair levels, suggesting that DNA repair capability contributes to life expectancy. See DNA damage theory of aging.

In a broad survey of zoo animals, no relationship was found between investment of the animal in reproduction and its life span.

Calculation

Further information: Life table § The mathematics
A survival tree to explain the calculations of life-expectancy. Red numbers indicate a chance of survival at a specific age, and blue ones indicate age-specific death rates.

In actuarial notation, the probability of surviving from age x {\displaystyle x} to age x + n {\displaystyle x+n} is denoted n p x {\displaystyle \,_{n}p_{x}\!} and the probability of dying during age x {\displaystyle x} (i.e. between ages x {\displaystyle x} and x + 1 {\displaystyle x+1} ) is denoted q x {\displaystyle q_{x}\!} . For example, if 10% of a group of people alive at their 90th birthday die before their 91st birthday, the age-specific death probability at 90 would be 10%. This probability describes the likelihood of dying at that age, and is not the rate at which people of that age die. It can be shown that

k p x q x + k = k p x k + 1 p x {\displaystyle {}_{k}p_{x}\,q_{x+k}={}_{k}p_{x}-{}_{k+1}p_{x}} 1

The curtate future lifetime, denoted K ( x ) {\displaystyle K(x)} , is a discrete random variable representing the remaining lifetime at age x {\displaystyle x} , rounded down to whole years. Life expectancy, more technically called the curtate expected lifetime and denoted e x {\displaystyle \,e_{x}\!} , is the mean of K ( x ) {\displaystyle K(x)} —that is to say, the expected number of whole years of life remaining, assuming survival to age x {\displaystyle x} . So,

e x = E [ K ( x ) ] = k = 0 k Pr ( K ( x ) = k ) = k = 0 k k p x q x + k {\displaystyle e_{x}=\operatorname {E} =\sum _{k=0}^{\infty }k\,\cdot \Pr(K(x)=k)=\sum _{k=0}^{\infty }k\,\,_{k}p_{x}\,\,q_{x+k}} 2

Substituting (1) into the sum and simplifying gives the final result

e x = k = 1 k p x {\displaystyle e_{x}=\sum _{k=1}^{\infty }{}\,\,\,_{k}p_{x}} 3

If the assumption is made that, on average, people live a half year on the year of their death, the complete life expectancy at age x {\displaystyle x} would be e x + 1 / 2 {\displaystyle e_{x}+1/2} , which is denoted by e̊x, and is the intuitive definition of life expectancy.

By definition, life expectancy is an arithmetic mean. It can also be calculated by integrating the survival curve from 0 to positive infinity (or equivalently to the maximum lifespan, sometimes called 'omega'). For an extinct or completed cohort (all people born in the year 1850, for example), it can of course simply be calculated by averaging the ages at death. For cohorts with some survivors, it is estimated by using mortality experience in recent years. The estimates are called period cohort life expectancies.

The starting point for calculating life expectancy is the age-specific death rates of the population members. If a large amount of data is available, a statistical population can be created that allow the age-specific death rates to be simply taken as the mortality rates actually experienced at each age (the number of deaths divided by the number of years "exposed to risk" in each data cell). However, it is customary to apply smoothing to remove (as much as possible) the random statistical fluctuations from one year of age to the next. In the past, a very simple model used for this purpose was the Gompertz function, but more sophisticated methods are now used. The most common modern methods include:

  • fitting a mathematical formula (such as the Gompertz function, or an extension of it) to the data.
  • looking at an established mortality table derived from a larger population and making a simple adjustment to it (such as multiplying by a constant factor) to fit the data. (In cases of relatively small amounts of data.)
  • looking at the mortality rates actually experienced at each age and applying a piecewise model (such as by cubic splines) to fit the data. (In cases of relatively large amounts of data.)

The age-specific death rates are calculated separately for separate groups of data that are believed to have different mortality rates (such as males and females, or smokers and non-smokers) and are then used to calculate a life table from which one can calculate the probability of surviving to each age. While the data required are easily identified in the case of humans, the computation of life expectancy of industrial products and wild animals involves more indirect techniques. The life expectancy and demography of wild animals are often estimated by capturing, marking, and recapturing them. The life of a product, more often termed shelf life, is also computed using similar methods. In the case of long-lived components, such as those used in critical applications (e.g. aircraft), methods like accelerated aging are used to model the life expectancy of a component.

The life expectancy statistic is usually based on past mortality experience and assumes that the same age-specific mortality rates will continue. Thus, such life expectancy figures need to be adjusted for temporal trends before calculating how long a currently living individual of a particular age is expected to live. Period life expectancy remains a commonly used statistic to summarize the current health status of a population. However, for some purposes, such as pensions calculations, it is usual to adjust the life table used by assuming that age-specific death rates will continue to decrease over the years, as they have usually done in the past. That is often done by simply extrapolating past trends, but some models exist to account for the evolution of mortality, like the Lee–Carter model.

As discussed above, on an individual basis, some factors correlate with longer life. Factors that are associated with variations in life expectancy include family history, marital status, economic status, physique, exercise, diet, drug use (including smoking and alcohol consumption), disposition, education, environment, sleep, climate, and health care.

Healthy life expectancy

To assess the quality of these additional years of life, 'healthy life expectancy' has been calculated for the last 30 years. Since 2001, the World Health Organization has published statistics called Healthy life expectancy (HALE), defined as the average number of years that a person can expect to live in "full health" excluding the years lived in less than full health due to disease and/or injury. Since 2004, Eurostat publishes annual statistics called Healthy Life Years (HLY) based on reported activity limitations. The United States uses similar indicators in the framework of the national health promotion and disease prevention plan "Healthy People 2010". More and more countries are using health expectancy indicators to monitor the health of their population.

Healthy Life Expectancy (HALE) vs GDP per Capita in different countries
Healthy Life Expectancy (HALE) vs GDP per Capita in different countries

The long-standing quest for longer life led in the 2010s to a more promising focus on increasing HALE, also known as a person's "healthspan". Besides the benefits of keeping people healthier longer, a goal is to reduce health-care expenses on the many diseases associated with cellular senescence. Approaches being explored include fasting, exercise, and senolytic drugs.

Forecasting

Forecasting life expectancy and mortality form an important subdivision of demography. Future trends in life expectancy have huge implications for old-age support programs (like U.S. Social Security and pension) since the cash flow in these systems depends on the number of recipients who are still living (along with the rate of return on the investments or the tax rate in pay-as-you-go systems). With longer life expectancies, the systems see increased cash outflow; if the systems underestimate increases in life-expectancies, they will be unprepared for the large payments that will occur, as humans live longer and longer.

Life expectancy forecasting is usually based on one of two different approaches:

  1. Forecasting the life expectancy directly, generally using ARIMA or other time-series extrapolation procedures. This has the advantage of simplicity, but it cannot account for changes in mortality at specific ages, and the forecast number cannot be used to derive other life table results. Analyses and forecasts using this approach can be done with any common statistical/mathematical software package, like EViews, R, SAS, Stata, Matlab, or SPSS.
  2. Forecasting age-specific death rates and computing the life expectancy from the results with life table methods. This is usually more complex than simply forecasting life expectancy because the analyst must deal with correlated age-specific mortality rates, but it seems to be more robust than simple one-dimensional time series approaches. It also yields a set of age-specific rates that may be used to derive other measures, such as survival curves or life expectancies at different ages. The most important approach in this group is the Lee-Carter model, which uses the singular value decomposition on a set of transformed age-specific mortality rates to reduce their dimensionality to a single time series, forecasts that time series, and then recovers a full set of age-specific mortality rates from that forecasted value. The software includes Professor Rob J. Hyndman's R package called 'demography' and UC Berkeley's LCFIT system.

Policy uses

Life expectancy is one of the factors in measuring the Human Development Index (HDI) of each nation along with adult literacy, education, and standard of living.

Life expectancy is used in describing the physical quality of life of an area. It is also used for an individual when the value of a life settlement is determined a life insurance policy is sold for a cash asset.

Disparities in life expectancy are often cited as demonstrating the need for better medical care or increased social support. A strongly associated indirect measure is income inequality. For the top 21 industrialized countries, if each person is counted equally, life expectancy is lower in more unequal countries (r = −0.907). There is a similar relationship among states in the U.S. (r = −0.620).

Life expectancy vs. other measures of longevity

"Remaining" life expectancy—expected number of remaining years of life as a function of current age—is used in retirement income planning.

Life expectancy may be confused with the average age an adult could expect to live, creating the misunderstanding that an adult's lifespan would be unlikely to exceed their life expectancy at birth. This is not the case, as life expectancy is an average of the lifespans of all individuals, including those who die before adulthood. One may compare the life expectancy of the period after childhood to estimate also the life expectancy of an adult.

As a measure of the years of life remaining, life expectancy decreases with age after initially rising in early childhood, but the average age to which a person is likely to live increases as they survive to successive higher ages. In the table above, the estimated modern hunter-gatherer average expectation of life at birth of 33 years (often considered an upper-bound for Paleolithic populations) equates to a life expectancy at 15 of 39 years, so that those surviving to age 15 will on average die at 54.

In England in the 13th–19th centuries with life expectancy at birth rising from perhaps 25 years to over 40, expectation of life at age 30 has been estimated at 20–30 years, giving an average age at death of about 50–60 for those (a minority at the start of the period but two-thirds at its end) surviving beyond their twenties.

Life expectancy increases with age already achieved.

The table above gives the life expectancy at birth among 13th-century English nobles as 30–33, but having surviving to the age of 21, a male member of the English aristocracy could expect to live:

  • 1200–1300: to age 64
  • 1300–1400: to age 45 (because of the bubonic plague)
  • 1400–1500: to age 69
  • 1500–1550: to age 71

A further concept is that of modal age at death, the single age when deaths among a population are more numerous than at any other age. In all pre-modern societies the most common age at death is the first year of life: it is only as infant mortality falls below around 33–34 per thousand (roughly a tenth of estimated ancient and medieval levels) that deaths in a later year of life (usually around age 80) become more numerous. While the most common age of death in adulthood among modern hunter-gatherers (often taken as a guide to the likely most favourable Paleolithic demographic experience) is estimated to average 72 years, the number dying at that age is dwarfed by those (over a fifth of all infants) dying in the first year of life, and only around a quarter usually survive to the higher age.

Maximum life span is an individual-specific concept, and therefore is an upper bound rather than an average. Science author Christopher Wanjek writes, "as the human race increased its life span? Not at all. This is one of the biggest misconceptions about old age: we are not living any longer." The maximum life span, or oldest age a human can live, may be constant. Further, there are many examples of people living significantly longer than the average life expectancy of their time period, such as Socrates (71), Saint Anthony the Great (105), Michelangelo (88), and John Adams (90).

However, anthropologist John D. Hawks criticizes the popular conflation of life span (life expectancy) and maximum life span when popular science writers falsely imply that the average adult human does not live longer than their ancestors. He writes, "ge-specific mortality rates have declined across the adult lifespan. A smaller fraction of adults die at 20, at 30, at 40, at 50, and so on across the lifespan. As a result, we live longer on average... In every way we can measure, human lifespans are longer today than in the immediate past, and longer today than they were 2000 years ago... age-specific mortality rates in adults really have reduced substantially."

See also

Increasing life expectancy

Notes

  1. ^ In standard actuarial notation, ex refers to the expected future lifetime of (x) in whole years, while x (with a ring above the e) denotes the complete expected future lifetime of (x), including the fraction.
  2. Japan's recorded life expectancy may have been very slightly increased by counting many infant deaths as stillborn.
  3. Note the different units: a probability is unit-less, whereas a mortality rate has units (such as deaths per population per year).

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