South Africa - Life expectancy at birth, female (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, female (years) in South Africa was 67.93 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 67.93 in 2020 and a minimum value of 51.16 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. (2) Census reports and other statistical publications from national statistical offices, (3) Eurostat: Demographic Statistics, (4) United Nations Statistical Division. Popu

See also:

Year Value
1960 51.16
1961 51.51
1962 51.86
1963 52.21
1964 52.57
1965 52.94
1966 53.34
1967 53.76
1968 54.21
1969 54.68
1970 55.17
1971 55.69
1972 56.23
1973 56.78
1974 57.34
1975 57.89
1976 58.44
1977 58.97
1978 59.48
1979 59.98
1980 60.48
1981 60.99
1982 61.54
1983 62.11
1984 62.71
1985 63.33
1986 63.99
1987 64.66
1988 65.31
1989 65.89
1990 66.34
1991 66.60
1992 66.64
1993 66.43
1994 65.97
1995 65.25
1996 64.27
1997 63.09
1998 61.79
1999 60.46
2000 59.19
2001 58.04
2002 57.09
2003 56.38
2004 55.97
2005 55.93
2006 56.28
2007 56.99
2008 58.00
2009 59.22
2010 60.57
2011 61.94
2012 63.24
2013 64.39
2014 65.36
2015 66.11
2016 66.65
2017 67.06
2018 67.40
2019 67.68
2020 67.93

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