[News in Numbers] Life Expectancy of Men Turning 60 This Year is 83.4 Years, Women 88.2 Years

Life expectancy, which initially decreased due to the impact of COVID-19, has been shown to increase again.

According to the '2023 Life Table' released by Statistics Korea, the life expectancy of newborns (age 0) last year was 83.5 years, an increase of 0.8 years compared to the previous year.

By gender, males had a life expectancy of 80.6 years and females 86.4 years, increasing by 0.7 years and 0.8 years respectively compared to one year ago. Life expectancy had steadily increased since related statistics began in 1970, but decreased for the first time in 2022 due to the impact of COVID-19 (-0.9 years).

Expected remaining years of life increased across all age groups for both men and women compared to the previous year. For 60-year-olds last year, men were expected to live an additional 23.4 years and women 28.2 years. This means those turning 61 years old (age 60 by international age) this year are expected to live up to 83.4 years for men and 88.2 years for women.

Additionally, the probability that children born last year will survive to age 80 was 63.6% for males and 81.8% for females. When comparing by gender, the probability of surviving to a certain age was higher for females than males across all age groups.

Although it is called the "100-year era," the probability of surviving to 100 years old was recorded at 1.0% for males and 4.6% for females.

The highest probability of death by major causes was cancer (malignant neoplasms). Based on last year’s newborns, the probability of dying from cancer was 19.1%, followed by pneumonia at 10.0%, heart disease at 10.0%, and cerebrovascular disease at 6.9%. The probability of death from COVID-19 decreased from 9.4% in 2022 to 2.4%.

If cancer were eliminated among major causes of death, life expectancy is estimated to increase by 3.3 years. If heart disease were eliminated, life expectancy would increase by 1.2 years, and if pneumonia were eliminated, it would increase by 1.0 year.

Meanwhile, South Korea’s life expectancy was higher than the average of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) by 2.2 years for males and 2.8 years for females. The life expectancy of major OECD member countries is 78.4 years for males and 83.6 years for females. The gender gap in life expectancy (5.9 years) was 0.6 years higher than the OECD average (5.3 years).

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.