According to the latest Eurostat data, women in the European Union enjoy a longer lifespan than men, but this advantage does not always translate into additional years.
Data show major differences between men and women / photo source: Shutterstock
In 17 EU countries, women expect to have a longer healthy life at birth than men. However, men generally spend a greater part of life without activity limitations, according to Euronews.com.
In the EU, the number of years of healthy life from birth in 2023 was 63.3 years for women and 62.8 years for men.
According to the latest Eurostat data, they represented about three quarters of the total life expectancy for women and four fifths for men.
In Romania, the report shows that women live on average 58.9 years of healthy life, and men 59.4 years, the figures being below the European average.
This data is important to understand if the extra years of life gained by increasing longevity are lived in a good or bad state.
However, these figures can be to some extent subjective, because they depend on the perception of the respondents on health, as well as on their social and cultural context.
Who are Europeans with most healthy years
Men in Malta, Italy and Sweden have lived most of the healthy years, while the lowest values were registered in Latvia, Estonia and Slovakia.
Among women, Malta has also recorded the largest number of healthy years, followed by Bulgaria and Italy.
Instead, women report the fewest years of healthy life in Latvia, Denmark and Finland.
What is the average life of men and women living on the European continent
Overall, life expectancy is 84 years for women and almost 79 years for men throughout the EU.
This means that a significant part of people’s lives is spent with activity limitations.
Men generally spend a greater proportion of life without activity limitations compared to women.
The estimated number of years of healthy life at birth was higher for women than for men in 17 of the EU countries.
Although the difference between sexes is generally small, women in Bulgaria, Slovenia, Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia have had more than three years of healthy life than men.
On the other hand, the Netherlands is the only country in the EU where the difference in favor of men exceeds three years.
List of bad habits that shorten your life
The more worry you do, the shorter the lifespan. Scientists claim that the fear of old age is the most “harmful” because this concern would reduce you by seven and a half years.
Recently published research suggests that only one cigarette reduces life by 22 minutes if you are a woman, respectively 17 minutes if you are a man. Also, a pizza reduces life by seven minutes and eight seconds, a glass of wine with 30 minutes and an hour of television by another 22 minutes!
