Sierra Leone - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Sierra Leone was 55.07 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 55.07 in 2020 and a minimum value of 31.57 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 31.57
1961 31.93
1962 32.30
1963 32.71
1964 33.13
1965 33.59
1966 34.07
1967 34.57
1968 35.08
1969 35.59
1970 36.10
1971 36.60
1972 37.09
1973 37.57
1974 38.03
1975 38.47
1976 38.88
1977 39.27
1978 39.62
1979 39.94
1980 40.19
1981 40.39
1982 40.50
1983 40.55
1984 40.51
1985 40.38
1986 40.15
1987 39.83
1988 39.44
1989 39.01
1990 38.56
1991 38.12
1992 37.72
1993 37.38
1994 37.16
1995 37.08
1996 37.19
1997 37.50
1998 37.98
1999 38.63
2000 39.44
2001 40.37
2002 41.38
2003 42.42
2004 43.47
2005 44.50
2006 45.52
2007 46.52
2008 47.51
2009 48.47
2010 49.38
2011 50.23
2012 51.02
2013 51.73
2014 52.37
2015 52.94
2016 53.44
2017 53.90
2018 54.31
2019 54.70
2020 55.07

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