Monday, July 1, 2013

Life expectancy at birth : How India compares with other Countries




Life expectancy at birth equals the average number of years a person born in a given country/state/region would live if mortality rates at each age were to remain constant in the future. The life expectancy is calculated separately for males and females as well as a combined figure. The figures reflect the quality of healthcare in the places of birth as well as other factors including ongoing wars, obesity, and HIV/AIDS infections etc.
Worldwide, the average life expectancy at birth (leb) was 67.88 years (65.71 years for males and 70.14 years for females) over the period 2005–2010 according to United Nations World Population Prospects 2010 Revision, and 66.57 years (64.52 years for males and 68.76 years for females) for 2009 according to The World Fact book 2009. Women on average live longer than men in all countries, with the exception of few countries namely, Zimbabwe, Lesotho,  Swaziland and Afghanistan.
As per the CIA Fact Book, the first rank among various entities (countries) is of Monaco with overall leb as 89.73 years.  The leb for Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, Italy, France, Canada, spain, Switzerland, Sweden, Germany and UK is above 80 years, wheras for USA and Peoples’ republic of China is 78.37 years and 73.47 years respectively.  India’s leb is at 69.89 with rank of 146 and it is above world’s average of 66.57 years.  All our neighboring countries are below the world’s average in this respect.  It is very shocking to know that leb for Afghanistan is at 45.02 years, Mozambique (41.18 years) and other countries with below 40 years leb are Zambia (38.63 years), Angola (38.2 years) and Swaziland (31.88 years).  These countries with very low leb are due to the reason of very high rates of HIV/AIDS infection.  In countries with high infant mortality rates, the life expectancy at birth will be lower, and may be materially lower than that of a person who has survived his or her first year of life.    

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