Why Do Women Live Longer Than Men

Everywhere in the world women live longer than men - but this was not always the case. The available data from rich countries shows that women didn't live longer than men in the 19th century. What's the main reason women have a longer life span than men? What is the reason does this benefit increase in the past? We only have a few clues and the evidence is not strong enough to make an unambiguous conclusion. We know there are biological, psychological as well as environmental factors which all play a part in women living longer than men, we do not know the extent to which each factor plays a role.

We have learned that women are living longer than men, regardless of weight. However, افضل كريم للشعر this is not due to the fact that certain biological or non-biological factors have changed. These factors are changing. Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Others are more complex. For example, there is evidence that in rich countries the female advantage increased in part because infectious diseases used to affect women disproportionately a century ago, so advances in medicine that reduced the long-term health burden from infectious diseases, especially for survivors, ended up raising women's longevity disproportionately.

Everywhere in the world women tend to live longer than men
The first chart below shows life expectancy at birth for men and women. It is clear that all countries are over the diagonal line of parity. This means that a newborn girl in every country can anticipate to live longer than her brother.

It is interesting to note that the advantage of women exists across all countries, the cross-country differences are large. In Russia women live 10 years longer than men. In Bhutan the gap is just half an hour.

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In the richer countries, افضل كريم للشعر the longevity advantage for women was not as great.
Let's examine how the gender advantage in life expectancy has changed over time. The next chart plots the male and female lifespans when they were born in the US between 1790 and 2014. Two distinct points stand out.

There is an upward trend. Both genders in America live longer than they did a century ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

Second, the gap is widening: While the female advantage in terms of life expectancy was quite small, it has increased substantially over time.

It is possible to verify that these principles are also applicable to other countries that have data by clicking the "Change country" option on the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.