Increasing life expectancy (LE) and reducing its variability across countries (the so-called “International Health Inequality”, IHI) are progressively prominent goals in global development agendas. Yet, LE is composed of two components: the number of years individuals are expected to live in “good” and in “less-than-good” health. While the first component (“Health-adjusted life expectancy”, HALE) is normatively desirable, the second one (“Unhealthy life expectancy”, UHLE, or LE – HALE) is highly controversial because of the high personal, social, and economic costs often associated with the presence of disease or disability – an issue that can muddy the waters when interpreting global health dynamics and calls for new conceptual approaches. Here we document how the evolution of HALE and UHLE between 1990 and 2019 have shaped (i) the trends and composition of LE both at the country, regional and the global levels, and (ii) the levels and trends in IHI. Our findings indicate that UHLE has tended to grow at a faster rate than HALE, thus leading to an expansion of morbidity in 75% of world countries. IHI increases until year 2000 and starts declining from that year onwards – a trend that is mostly determined by the evolution of HALE across countries. While still minoritarian, UHLE is a non-negligible and increasingly relevant factor determining the levels of international health inequality (IHI). These findings and ideas are useful to understand the role that the healthy and unhealthy components of LE are playing in contemporary health dynamics and for the elaboration of policies aiming at tackling health inequalities both across and within countries.
Presented by:
Prof. Iñaki Permanyer (Centre d'Estudis Demogràfics (CED), Autonomous University of Barcelona, and ICREA)
Date & time:
March 9, 2022 12:30 pm - March 9, 2022 1:30 pm
Venue:
Remotely via Zoom - contact the series organisers (at iserseminars@essex.ac.uk) if you do not have the link
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