Dem. People's Rep. Korea - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Dem. People's Rep. Korea was 72.45 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 72.45 in 2020 and a minimum value of 51.30 in 1960.

Definition: Life expectancy at birth indicates the number of years a newborn infant would live if prevailing patterns of mortality at the time of its birth were to stay the same throughout its life.

Source: (1) United Nations Population Division. World Population Prospects: 2019 Revision, or derived from male and female life expectancy at birth from sources such as: (2) Census reports and other statistical publications from national statistical offices, (3)

See also:

Year Value
1960 51.30
1961 51.67
1962 52.08
1963 52.61
1964 53.34
1965 54.26
1966 55.36
1967 56.51
1968 57.63
1969 58.68
1970 59.66
1971 60.55
1972 61.38
1973 62.16
1974 62.90
1975 63.58
1976 64.21
1977 64.78
1978 65.29
1979 65.76
1980 66.19
1981 66.57
1982 66.92
1983 67.26
1984 67.57
1985 67.90
1986 68.28
1987 68.72
1988 69.18
1989 69.61
1990 69.90
1991 69.88
1992 69.49
1993 68.74
1994 67.70
1995 66.54
1996 65.50
1997 64.77
1998 64.49
1999 64.68
2000 65.27
2001 66.09
2002 66.93
2003 67.62
2004 68.10
2005 68.39
2006 68.54
2007 68.68
2008 68.88
2009 69.19
2010 69.57
2011 70.01
2012 70.45
2013 70.85
2014 71.20
2015 71.48
2016 71.71
2017 71.91
2018 72.10
2019 72.27
2020 72.45

Development Relevance: Mortality rates for different age groups (infants, children, and adults) and overall mortality indicators (life expectancy at birth or survival to a given age) are important indicators of health status in a country. Because data on the incidence and prevalence of diseases are frequently unavailable, mortality rates are often used to identify vulnerable populations. And they are among the indicators most frequently used to compare socioeconomic development across countries.

Limitations and Exceptions: Annual data series from United Nations Population Division's World Population Prospects are interpolated data from 5-year period data. Therefore they may not reflect real events as much as observed data.

Statistical Concept and Methodology: Life expectancy at birth used here is the average number of years a newborn is expected to live if mortality patterns at the time of its birth remain constant in the future. It reflects the overall mortality level of a population, and summarizes the mortality pattern that prevails across all age groups in a given year. It is calculated in a period life table which provides a snapshot of a population's mortality pattern at a given time. It therefore does not reflect the mortality pattern that a person actually experiences during his/her life, which can be calculated in a cohort life table. High mortality in young age groups significantly lowers the life expectancy at birth. But if a person survives his/her childhood of high mortality, he/she may live much longer. For example, in a population with a life expectancy at birth of 50, there may be few people dying at age 50. The life expectancy at birth may be low due to the high childhood mortality so that once a person survives his/her childhood, he/she may live much longer than 50 years.

Aggregation method: Weighted average

Periodicity: Annual

Classification

Topic: Health Indicators

Sub-Topic: Mortality