Global life expectancy increased by 6.2 years between 1990 and 2021: Study
Representative image.
A recent study has said that global life expectancy increased by 6.2 years between 1990 and 2021. The study, published in the Lancet journal on Wednesday (Apr 3), said that the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2021 cause-of-death analysis estimated mortality and years of life lost (YLLs) from 288 causes of death by age-sex-location-year in 204 countries and territories and 811 subnational locations for each year from 1990 until 2021.
The study said that the leading causes of age-standardised deaths globally were the same in 2019 as they were in 1990- in descending order, these were ischaemic heart disease, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and lower respiratory infections.
Covid disrupted long-standing gains in life expectancy
In 2021, COVID-19 replaced stroke as the second-leading age-standardised cause of death. "The COVID-19 pandemic shifted the rankings of the leading five causes, lowering stroke to the third-leading and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease to the fourth-leading position," the study added.
"Long-standing gains in life expectancy and reductions in many of the leading causes of death have been disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, the adverse effects of which were spread unevenly among populations," it said.
From 1990 to 2019, the global increase in life expectancy totalled 7.8 years. However, from 2019 to 2021, there was a global decline in life expectancy of 2.2 years due to deaths from COVID-19 and Other Pandemic Related Mortality (OPRM) combined.
This decrease was partly offset by reductions in other diseases, for a net reduction in global life expectancy of 1.6 years. Despite this notable reduction, researchers observed an overall increase in life expectancy of 6.2 years across the entire study period.
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The study further said that among the various contributing factors to a change in life expectancy, the cause with the greatest effect on the increase in life expectancy worldwide was the reduction in deaths caused by enteric infections which include diarrhoeal, typhoid, and paratyphoid diseases.
A reduction in deaths from these diseases has been responsible for a substantial increase in life expectancy of 1.1 years between 1990 and 2021.
'A nuanced picture of world's health'
Dr Liane Ong, co-first author of the study, said in a statement that the analysis presented a nuanced picture of the world's health. "On one hand, we see countries' monumental achievements in preventing deaths from diarrhoea and stroke. At the same time, we see how much the COVID-19 pandemic has set us back," Dr Ong said in a statement.