Lesotho - Life expectancy at birth, total (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, total (years) in Lesotho was 54.84 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 60.00 in 1989 and a minimum value of 42.60 in 2006.

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 47.92
1961 48.16
1962 48.38
1963 48.59
1964 48.80
1965 49.02
1966 49.25
1967 49.52
1968 49.83
1969 50.18
1970 50.58
1971 51.05
1972 51.57
1973 52.13
1974 52.73
1975 53.37
1976 54.03
1977 54.71
1978 55.39
1979 56.06
1980 56.70
1981 57.32
1982 57.90
1983 58.44
1984 58.91
1985 59.31
1986 59.63
1987 59.87
1988 60.00
1989 60.00
1990 59.84
1991 59.46
1992 58.87
1993 58.05
1994 57.02
1995 55.78
1996 54.33
1997 52.73
1998 51.03
1999 49.33
2000 47.69
2001 46.20
2002 44.90
2003 43.85
2004 43.08
2005 42.66
2006 42.60
2007 42.85
2008 43.38
2009 44.15
2010 45.10
2011 46.21
2012 47.42
2013 48.66
2014 49.89
2015 51.04
2016 52.06
2017 52.95
2018 53.71
2019 54.33
2020 54.84

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