Latvia - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Latvia was 75.39 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 75.39 in 2020 and a minimum value of 65.66 in 1994.

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 69.79
1961 70.03
1962 69.43
1963 69.83
1964 71.03
1965 70.73
1966 70.71
1967 70.39
1968 70.04
1969 69.80
1970 69.84
1971 70.16
1972 69.88
1973 69.81
1974 69.74
1975 68.93
1976 69.05
1977 69.10
1978 68.99
1979 68.50
1980 68.81
1981 68.79
1982 69.33
1983 69.12
1984 69.16
1985 69.29
1986 70.62
1987 70.69
1988 70.62
1989 70.16
1990 69.27
1991 69.03
1992 68.40
1993 66.72
1994 65.66
1995 66.39
1996 68.78
1997 69.35
1998 69.01
1999 69.74
2000 70.31
2001 70.76
2002 70.96
2003 71.27
2004 72.03
2005 71.36
2006 70.87
2007 71.02
2008 72.42
2009 73.08
2010 73.48
2011 73.58
2012 73.78
2013 73.98
2014 74.12
2015 74.48
2016 74.58
2017 74.63
2018 74.78
2019 75.39
2020 75.39

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