South Asia - Life expectancy at birth, male (years)

The value for Life expectancy at birth, male (years) in South Asia was 68.60 as of 2020. As the graph below shows, over the past 60 years this indicator reached a maximum value of 68.60 in 2020 and a minimum value of 42.80 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 42.80
1961 43.43
1962 44.05
1963 44.66
1964 45.27
1965 45.87
1966 46.46
1967 47.02
1968 47.55
1969 48.07
1970 48.58
1971 49.10
1972 49.62
1973 50.17
1974 50.73
1975 51.29
1976 51.86
1977 52.41
1978 52.93
1979 53.42
1980 53.88
1981 54.31
1982 54.70
1983 55.08
1984 55.44
1985 55.80
1986 56.17
1987 56.54
1988 56.93
1989 57.34
1990 57.76
1991 58.19
1992 58.63
1993 59.08
1994 59.51
1995 59.95
1996 60.38
1997 60.80
1998 61.22
1999 61.63
2000 62.02
2001 62.41
2002 62.79
2003 63.17
2004 63.54
2005 63.91
2006 64.29
2007 64.67
2008 65.05
2009 65.44
2010 65.82
2011 66.19
2012 66.54
2013 66.87
2014 67.17
2015 67.45
2016 67.71
2017 67.95
2018 68.18
2019 68.39
2020 68.60

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