Belgium - Life expectancy at birth, female (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, female (years) in Belgium was 83.10 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 84.30 in 2019 and a minimum value of 72.77 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 72.77
1961 73.63
1962 73.18
1963 73.14
1964 73.90
1965 73.76
1966 73.80
1967 74.25
1968 73.92
1969 74.13
1970 74.25
1971 74.40
1972 74.76
1973 74.98
1974 75.31
1975 75.28
1976 75.49
1977 76.18
1978 76.14
1979 76.61
1980 76.69
1981 77.12
1982 77.33
1983 77.27
1984 77.98
1985 78.08
1986 78.23
1987 78.90
1988 79.10
1989 79.09
1990 79.54
1991 79.67
1992 79.87
1993 79.90
1994 80.19
1995 80.38
1996 80.66
1997 80.70
1998 80.70
1999 81.00
2000 81.00
2001 81.20
2002 81.20
2003 81.10
2004 81.90
2005 81.90
2006 82.30
2007 82.60
2008 82.60
2009 82.80
2010 83.00
2011 83.30
2012 83.10
2013 83.20
2014 83.90
2015 83.40
2016 84.00
2017 83.90
2018 83.90
2019 84.30
2020 83.10

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