IDA only - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in IDA only was 65.90 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 65.90 in 2020 and a minimum value of 41.04 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 41.04
1961 41.52
1962 41.99
1963 42.47
1964 42.94
1965 43.38
1966 43.79
1967 44.15
1968 44.46
1969 44.73
1970 44.96
1971 45.20
1972 45.47
1973 45.78
1974 46.14
1975 46.56
1976 47.05
1977 47.56
1978 48.10
1979 48.62
1980 49.13
1981 49.67
1982 50.13
1983 50.59
1984 51.03
1985 51.45
1986 51.83
1987 52.16
1988 52.45
1989 52.73
1990 52.97
1991 53.23
1992 53.50
1993 53.79
1994 54.11
1995 54.45
1996 54.82
1997 55.19
1998 55.58
1999 56.00
2000 56.43
2001 56.89
2002 57.37
2003 57.89
2004 58.45
2005 59.02
2006 59.61
2007 60.21
2008 60.80
2009 61.37
2010 61.91
2011 62.42
2012 62.91
2013 63.38
2014 63.82
2015 64.23
2016 64.62
2017 64.97
2018 65.31
2019 65.61
2020 65.90

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