Life expectancy in Canada increased steadily throughout the 20th Century
Life expectancy at birth was 79.1 years for males and 83.4 years for females for the 2009/2011 period. Over the last decade, the life expectancy of males increased on average by about 4 months every year, while gains for females were lower, at 2.4 months per year.
The gap between the life expectancy at birth between males and females decreased from a maximum of 7.3 years in the late 1970s to 4.3 years in 2009/2011. Many factors are related to this trend, with three of the most important being the reduction in violent deaths among male teenagers and young adults, better treatment for cardiovascular diseases and increasing similarity of women’s behaviour to that of men, particularly in the case of smoking, drinking and work-related stress.
According to the medium mortality assumption in the most recent population projections, the life expectancy at birth of males and females would reach 84.0 years and 87.3 years, respectively, in 2036.
Table 1
Life expectancy at birth by sex, Canada, 1941 to 2009/2011 Table summary
This table displays the results of Life expectancy at birth by sex. The information is grouped by Year (appearing as row headers), Males and Females, calculated using in years units of measure (appearing as column headers).
Year
Males
Females
in years
1941
63.0
66.3
1945
64.7
68.0
1950/1952
66.3
70.8
1955/1957
67.6
72.9
1960/1962
68.4
74.2
1965/1967
68.8
75.2
1970/1972
69.3
76.4
1975/1977
70.2
77.5
1980/1982
72.0
79.1
1985/1987
73.2
79.9
1990/1992
74.5
80.8
1995/1997
75.4
81.1
2000/2002
76.9
81.9
2005/2007
78.1
82.7
2006/2008
78.3
82.9
2007/2009
78.5
83.0
2008/2010
78.8
83.2
2009/2011
79.1
83.4
Source(s): From 1941 to 1975/1977, Statistics Canada, official life tables and from 1980/1982, Demography Division.
