Congo - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Congo was 64.80 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 64.80 in 2020 and a minimum value of 45.72 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 45.72
1961 46.34
1962 46.93
1963 47.49
1964 48.02
1965 48.52
1966 48.99
1967 49.45
1968 49.89
1969 50.31
1970 50.73
1971 51.13
1972 51.51
1973 51.89
1974 52.25
1975 52.60
1976 52.94
1977 53.28
1978 53.61
1979 53.93
1980 54.23
1981 54.51
1982 54.76
1983 54.98
1984 55.15
1985 55.26
1986 55.29
1987 55.25
1988 55.12
1989 54.92
1990 54.64
1991 54.28
1992 53.87
1993 53.42
1994 52.98
1995 52.58
1996 52.25
1997 52.02
1998 51.90
1999 51.93
2000 52.12
2001 52.52
2002 53.09
2003 53.82
2004 54.67
2005 55.60
2006 56.57
2007 57.54
2008 58.47
2009 59.32
2010 60.09
2011 60.79
2012 61.42
2013 62.02
2014 62.58
2015 63.10
2016 63.56
2017 63.95
2018 64.29
2019 64.57
2020 64.80

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