Ghana - Life expectancy at birth, female (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, female (years) in Ghana was 65.48 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 65.48 in 2020 and a minimum value of 46.15 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 46.15
1961 46.62
1962 47.06
1963 47.48
1964 47.88
1965 48.26
1966 48.65
1967 49.03
1968 49.43
1969 49.84
1970 50.26
1971 50.67
1972 51.08
1973 51.46
1974 51.81
1975 52.14
1976 52.44
1977 52.72
1978 52.99
1979 53.25
1980 53.52
1981 53.80
1982 54.11
1983 54.44
1984 54.81
1985 55.21
1986 55.69
1987 56.22
1988 56.78
1989 57.35
1990 57.88
1991 58.30
1992 58.58
1993 58.70
1994 58.67
1995 58.52
1996 58.29
1997 58.05
1998 57.86
1999 57.75
2000 57.76
2001 57.93
2002 58.21
2003 58.60
2004 59.07
2005 59.60
2006 60.14
2007 60.67
2008 61.16
2009 61.59
2010 61.97
2011 62.31
2012 62.65
2013 63.00
2014 63.37
2015 63.75
2016 64.13
2017 64.50
2018 64.85
2019 65.18
2020 65.48

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