Zambia - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Zambia was 64.19 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 64.19 in 2020 and a minimum value of 43.41 in 1998.

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 46.69
1961 47.08
1962 47.45
1963 47.77
1964 48.07
1965 48.35
1966 48.64
1967 48.96
1968 49.31
1969 49.70
1970 50.11
1971 50.54
1972 50.96
1973 51.35
1974 51.70
1975 52.00
1976 52.25
1977 52.45
1978 52.61
1979 52.72
1980 52.80
1981 52.86
1982 52.91
1983 52.92
1984 52.87
1985 52.72
1986 52.40
1987 51.89
1988 51.17
1989 50.28
1990 49.25
1991 48.13
1992 46.99
1993 45.92
1994 44.98
1995 44.24
1996 43.74
1997 43.46
1998 43.41
1999 43.59
2000 44.00
2001 44.62
2002 45.40
2003 46.32
2004 47.35
2005 48.50
2006 49.76
2007 51.13
2008 52.61
2009 54.13
2010 55.66
2011 57.13
2012 58.50
2013 59.75
2014 60.83
2015 61.74
2016 62.46
2017 63.04
2018 63.51
2019 63.89
2020 64.19

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