There is one area where girls unquestionably surpass boys: that of longevity. The trend is confirmed once again when reading the latest publication from the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (Insee), published Thursday, November 10, which relates to the life expectancy of children born in 2022.
Based on the assumptions of the central scenario of the population projections, the statistical institute calculates that the little girls born this year have an average life expectancy of ninety-three years. She is ninety years old for little boys. If we consider the lowest range, it goes down to eighty-eight years for girls and eighty-six years for boys. Conversely, the most optimistic projections imagine an average life expectancy of ninety-nine years for girls and eighty-six years for boys of this generation.
These forecasts are not in the same register as the instantaneous life expectancy, presented each year in the INSEE demographic report, which in 2021 was 85.4 years for women and 79.3 years for men. men. The instantaneous life expectancy is calculated from the mortality figures of the year considered, while the life expectancy of the generation born in 2022 is calculated from the mortality data projections.
On the other hand, it is possible to compare the theoretical indicator of life expectancy of the generation of 2022 with the life expectancy of those born in 1900. “We have the real lifespan of people of this generation because they are all dead now”, explains Sylvie Le Minez, head of the demographic and social studies unit at INSEE. And the gap is dizzying; girls born in 1900 lived on average fifty-six years and boys forty-eight years, i.e. an increase of thirty-seven years for women and forty-two years for men between this generation and that of 2022.
record life expectancy
Observing the evolution of life expectancy per generation is also a mirror of history, global conflicts and scientific progress. Since it was calculated, it has not stopped increasing, which is of course largely due to progress in medicine, the fight against infant mortality and better living conditions. INSEE notes that “the pace of progress was particularly rapid for the generations born between 1900 and 1937”, with the exception of those born between 1910 and 1919, who experienced the two world wars as well as a heat wave in 1911 and the Spanish flu of 1918-1919. It has settled down again for those born from 1937 to 1945.
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