Life expectancy in Africa is lower than on other continents

Where you are born and stay for much of your life is a strong predictor of how long you’re likely to live. The chart shows the differences in period life expectancy across continents.

Average life expectancy has converged to a fairly narrow band between 75 and 80 years in North America, Oceania, Europe, Latin America, and Asia. Africa stands out: its average life expectancy is 64 years, over a decade lower than any other region.

This gap reflects several overlapping factors: high rates of child and maternal deaths, a heavy burden of infectious diseases such as malaria, HIV/AIDS, and tuberculosis, limited access to quality healthcare and infrastructure, and high levels of poverty.

Despite this, life expectancy in Africa has risen by almost two decades since 1974.

Explore life expectancy for individual countries →

Where this page came from

This page was imported from Our World in Data. “Life expectancy in Africa is lower than on other continents” by Simon van Teutem, published by Our World in Data under CC BY 4.0. Changed here: set as a page, its interactive charts shown as pictures. Data from third parties keeps its own licence.

Nobody has written it yet — it is the source material at a new address, which is why search engines are asked to skip it and why no one earns from it. It is up for grabs: take it on, and it is yours to rewrite and to earn from.