Samoa - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Samoa was 73.45 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 73.45 in 2020 and a minimum value of 56.90 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 56.90
1961 57.19
1962 57.47
1963 57.76
1964 58.05
1965 58.34
1966 58.64
1967 58.95
1968 59.27
1969 59.59
1970 59.92
1971 60.26
1972 60.60
1973 60.95
1974 61.30
1975 61.66
1976 62.03
1977 62.41
1978 62.80
1979 63.18
1980 63.57
1981 63.94
1982 64.29
1983 64.62
1984 64.92
1985 65.19
1986 65.44
1987 65.67
1988 65.88
1989 66.09
1990 66.28
1991 66.47
1992 66.66
1993 66.84
1994 67.04
1995 67.25
1996 67.49
1997 67.76
1998 68.07
1999 68.40
2000 68.75
2001 69.10
2002 69.45
2003 69.78
2004 70.09
2005 70.37
2006 70.64
2007 70.90
2008 71.16
2009 71.41
2010 71.66
2011 71.91
2012 72.14
2013 72.35
2014 72.55
2015 72.73
2016 72.90
2017 73.05
2018 73.19
2019 73.32
2020 73.45

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