Jamaica - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Jamaica was 74.59 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 74.59 in 2020 and a minimum value of 64.77 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, 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 64.77
1961 65.13
1962 65.47
1963 65.78
1964 66.10
1965 66.42
1966 66.74
1967 67.05
1968 67.35
1969 67.64
1970 67.92
1971 68.20
1972 68.49
1973 68.79
1974 69.10
1975 69.41
1976 69.72
1977 70.02
1978 70.29
1979 70.55
1980 70.79
1981 71.01
1982 71.22
1983 71.42
1984 71.61
1985 71.82
1986 72.06
1987 72.32
1988 72.60
1989 72.90
1990 73.20
1991 73.49
1992 73.73
1993 73.92
1994 74.05
1995 74.13
1996 74.17
1997 74.17
1998 74.16
1999 74.15
2000 74.14
2001 74.14
2002 74.14
2003 74.14
2004 74.15
2005 74.15
2006 74.14
2007 74.13
2008 74.10
2009 74.07
2010 74.04
2011 74.01
2012 74.00
2013 74.01
2014 74.04
2015 74.10
2016 74.18
2017 74.27
2018 74.37
2019 74.48
2020 74.59

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