Mortality Flashcards
Life expectancy
Period measure
The average age of death in a specific year
Look at all the deaths that occurred in that year and make an average age of death
You take the age structure of the country into account
Correlation between GDP-growth and life expectancy
Across all countries: Positive correlation –> the higher the GDP the higher the life expectancy.
However, there is a ceiling effect.
- Huge effects among countries with low level of GDP –> here small increases in BNP increases the life expectancy a lot –> clean water, food, housing etc. helps especially with child mortality
- No effects for high levels of GDP
How can you increase life expectancy in high income countries? (where there is no longer a positive effect of GDP)?
Reducement of health inequality
Access to quality health care
What is the epidemiological transition?
A transition where the life expectancy at birth increases because the country develops
Causes of death vary with a country’s development stage → when the transition is set in motion, the causes of death among the people change and death goes from being most likely for children to being most likely for old people.
- Early stages of development: Epidemics and infectious diseases (cholera, typhus etc.)
- Later stages of development: Man-made diseases
What factors put the epidemiological transition in motion?
Socioeconomic factors: Improvement in nutrition, personal cleanliness, housing
Medical and public health factors:
Public sanitation, immunization and development of e.g. vaccines.
Endogenous vs eksogenous death causes
Endogenous: Causes from within/determined beforehand (e.g. genes)
Exogenous: Causes from outside (e.g. your behavior, a fire, a car crash etc.)
Discussion of where you should put e.g. cancer?
What do children die of?
Children under 5
Main causes of death: infectious diseases
Infants
SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome)
Sudden death of children under the age of 1
The child stops breathing (crib death)
Doctors have a hard time explaining why
How does the risk of dying differ amongst age groups?
Risk of dying between different age-groups is U-shaped
Small children (0-5): High risk
Children (5-15): Very small risk
Above 15: Risk of dying increases by age
How does the risk of dying differ amongst gender?
Across all age groups men have a higher risk of dying than women
Two reasons:
Biological: Life expectancy at birth is lower for men
Behavioral: Stress, fat eating, drugs, alcohol etc.
Which countries have the highest gender gaps in life expectancy?
The gender-gap is biggest in high income countries and lowest in countries at low stages of development
Previous Sovjet States as an outlier: not because they are rich –> Russia, Belarus, Lithuania
At which age groups does the risk of men dying increase? (excess male mortality)
Age 15-19 (teenage years): puberty, more violence between men, men are less risk-averse, drugs, alcohol, more suicides
Women at this age more often try to commit suicide - but men succeed more in their attempts.
Age 55-59: Cancer + cardiovascular diseases → men smoke more, drink more, eat worse, works more (stress), goes less to the doctor
Has the gender gap gotten bigger or smaller over time?
Generally the gender caps have been decreasing since
Is that good or bad?
Depends if it is because women are doing worse or men are doing better.
Example: The US
The gap has been decreasing because women’s lifestyle has adapted more to men’s since the women’s liberation → women smoke more, work more etc. → not good.
The US also have a big problem with deaths caused by pain-medication
Sex-ratio at birth
Natural sex ratio: 100 women, 105 men.
Some countries have higher natural sex ratios, since they have a preference for boys → e.g. China, South Korea
This can create problems long term: e.g. on the marriage market.
How does life expectancy differ amongst peoples social status?
Poor people have lower life expectancies than rich people
While-collar workers in average live 5 years longer than blue-collar workers
Why?
Differences in knowledge, power money
Differences in access to health care
Different behavior/lifestyles
More psycho-social stress
What does healthy life expectancy mean?
Is it a good thing that we live longer if the extra years are spent on disability?
“Healthy Life Years” → measure of disability free expectancy
The gender gap is smaller when you look at HLY instead of just life expectancy
Meaning: A lot of women spend their “extra” years of life disabled.
