The Gambia - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in The Gambia was 62.38 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 62.38 in 2020 and a minimum value of 32.05 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 32.05
1961 32.34
1962 32.67
1963 33.07
1964 33.54
1965 34.10
1966 34.74
1967 35.45
1968 36.21
1969 37.02
1970 37.87
1971 38.73
1972 39.61
1973 40.49
1974 41.35
1975 42.21
1976 43.05
1977 43.88
1978 44.71
1979 45.53
1980 46.34
1981 47.13
1982 47.90
1983 48.65
1984 49.35
1985 50.00
1986 50.58
1987 51.08
1988 51.52
1989 51.89
1990 52.22
1991 52.53
1992 52.83
1993 53.16
1994 53.51
1995 53.89
1996 54.30
1997 54.72
1998 55.13
1999 55.55
2000 55.96
2001 56.36
2002 56.76
2003 57.16
2004 57.55
2005 57.94
2006 58.31
2007 58.67
2008 59.01
2009 59.33
2010 59.64
2011 59.92
2012 60.18
2013 60.43
2014 60.67
2015 60.91
2016 61.17
2017 61.44
2018 61.74
2019 62.05
2020 62.38

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