Why 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? Why the advantage has grown in the past? The evidence is sketchy and we're only able to provide incomplete answers. Although we know that there are biological, behavioral, and environmental factors that all play a role in women who live longer than men, we do not know how much each factor contributes.

In spite of how much amount, we can say that at a minimum, the reason why women live longer than men today, but not in the past, is to have to do with the fact that certain important non-biological aspects have changed. The factors changing are numerous. Some are well known and relatively straightforward, like the fact that men smoke more often. Other are more complicated. 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, زيوت تطويل الشعر (head to Glorynote) so advances in medicine that reduced the long-term health burden from infectious diseases, especially for survivors, ended up raising women's longevity disproportionately.

Everywhere in the world women tend to live longer than men
The first chart below shows life expectancy at birth for men and women. We can see that every country is above the diagonal line of parity - which means that in every country a newborn girl can expect to live longer than a newborn boy.1

This chart is interesting in that it shows that although the female advantage exists everywhere, the global differences are significant. In Russia women are 10 years older than men; in Bhutan the difference is just half an hour.

__S.17__
__S.19__
The advantage of women in terms of life expectancy was lower in rich countries that it is today.
Let's look at how female longevity advantage has changed in the course of time. The next chart plots male and female life expectancy at birth in the US between 1790 and 2014. Two points stand out.

First, there is an upward trend. and women in the US are living much, much longer than they did 100 years ago. This is in line with historical increases in life expectancy everywhere in the world.

Second, the gap is growing: Although the female advantage in terms of life expectancy was very small, it has increased substantially in the past.

You can verify that the points you've listed are applicable to other countries with data by selecting the "Change country" option on the chart. This includes the UK, France, and Sweden.