Vietnam - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Vietnam was 75.49 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 75.49 in 2020 and a minimum value of 58.83 in 1972.

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 59.04
1961 59.72
1962 60.39
1963 61.02
1964 61.58
1965 61.96
1966 62.04
1967 61.77
1968 61.19
1969 60.38
1970 59.56
1971 58.98
1972 58.83
1973 59.20
1974 60.11
1975 61.45
1976 63.01
1977 64.55
1978 65.86
1979 66.87
1980 67.54
1981 67.94
1982 68.20
1983 68.44
1984 68.69
1985 68.97
1986 69.29
1987 69.62
1988 69.94
1989 70.25
1990 70.55
1991 70.84
1992 71.12
1993 71.40
1994 71.67
1995 71.92
1996 72.17
1997 72.40
1998 72.62
1999 72.82
2000 73.03
2001 73.23
2002 73.44
2003 73.65
2004 73.88
2005 74.09
2006 74.30
2007 74.47
2008 74.63
2009 74.75
2010 74.84
2011 74.90
2012 74.96
2013 75.01
2014 75.06
2015 75.11
2016 75.17
2017 75.24
2018 75.32
2019 75.40
2020 75.49

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