Life expectancy in Estonia has fallen

Text Mark Taylor
Photo Danie Franco / Unsplash

According to Statistics Estonia, in 2021, life expectancy was 77.2 years. Male life expectancy was 72.8 years and female life expectancy was 81.4 years. Life expectancy decreased by a year and a half for both men and women in 2021, primarily due to the pandemic.

“Life expectancy increased steadily from 1995 until 2020, but the trend has decelerated in recent years due to the pandemic. The exceptionally large number of deaths last year means that life expectancy decreased for both men and women, as it fell to the same level as eight years ago. The decrease in life expectancy has been steeper for men than for women,” explained Marin Tasuja, a leading analyst at Statistics Estonia.

Compared to 2020, life expectancy decreased by a year and seven months for men and by a year and four months for women, although there are regional variations.

“In urban areas, life expectancy in 2021 fell similarly to the Estonian average, that is, by a year and a half. But life expectancy in rural areas decreased by almost two years. Compared to 2020, there was no decrease in life expectancy for women in Viljandi and Hiiu counties,” said Tasuja.

There has also been a decrease in healthy life years. According to 2021 data, men will live disability-free for 54.9 years and women for 58 years. “Thus, compared to 2020, healthy life years have decreased by seven months for men and by a year and a half for women in Estonia. A comparison of demographic groups indicates that disability-free life expectancy has fallen the most among persons with lower education and residents of urban areas,” added Tasuja.

Life expectancy depends on many factors. The greatest differences occur in the breakdown by education: life expectancy is 81 years for persons with higher education but over ten years less (70.3 years) for persons with basic education. Among counties, life expectancy is the highest in Hiiu and Tartu counties, and the lowest in Ida-Viru and Võru counties. The difference in life expectancy between residents of Hiiu and Ida-Viru counties was 4.5 years. Non-Estonians living in Estonia are expected to live almost two years less than Estonians – 75.6 and 77.5 years, respectively.

Estonia has the highest life expectancy of the three Baltic states. In 2021, this indicator was 73.1 years in Latvia, which is two years less than in 2020. In Lithuania, life expectancy was 75.1 years in 2020. Although statistics for 2021 have yet to be released, it is expected to fall by a similar figure to Estonia and Latvia in 2021.

Although Estonia has the highest life expectancy in the Baltics, it remains below the European average, which was 80.4 years in 2020.

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