Lesotho - Life expectancy at birth, female (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, female (years) in Lesotho was 58.09 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 64.07 in 1989 and a minimum value of 45.10 in 2005.

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 52.17
1961 52.39
1962 52.59
1963 52.77
1964 52.95
1965 53.14
1966 53.35
1967 53.59
1968 53.87
1969 54.20
1970 54.58
1971 55.03
1972 55.52
1973 56.06
1974 56.65
1975 57.26
1976 57.91
1977 58.57
1978 59.25
1979 59.92
1980 60.57
1981 61.20
1982 61.79
1983 62.35
1984 62.84
1985 63.26
1986 63.60
1987 63.87
1988 64.03
1989 64.07
1990 63.94
1991 63.60
1992 63.05
1993 62.26
1994 61.25
1995 59.99
1996 58.46
1997 56.70
1998 54.79
1999 52.81
2000 50.87
2001 49.09
2002 47.56
2003 46.35
2004 45.51
2005 45.10
2006 45.11
2007 45.49
2008 46.14
2009 47.02
2010 48.07
2011 49.26
2012 50.53
2013 51.83
2014 53.09
2015 54.27
2016 55.30
2017 56.19
2018 56.95
2019 57.58
2020 58.09

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