Male life expectancy up 1.4 years over last decade

Men can expect to enjoy more healthy years

Men in Jersey are living on average one-year four months longer than they were 10 years ago, research by Public Heath Jersey shows.

But, the research showed women's life expectancy remained the same during this period.

On average, women in Jersey have a life expectancy of 84.9 years and men 81.3 years, researchers said.

Public Health Jersey said it was unlikely a single factor was driving the slight rise in male life expectancy, more likely it was a combination of progress in several health and wellbeing areas, such as declining smoking rates and improving treatments.

Jersey's life expectancy at birth is about two years higher than in England and one year higher than people in the south-west of England, the report said.

It was similar to Guernsey's life expectancy at birth and at age 65 for both men and women, researchers found.

According to the research, islanders on Jersey aged 65 could expect to live a further 21.3 years, with women likely to live another 22.5 years, 2.7 more years than men.

Researchers also predicted men could have 65.4 years of good health, with women expected to enjoy four fewer healthy years.

This prediction of healthy life expectancy at birth was a drop of 8.3 years for women since 2016-2018.

Every year, people in between 3,000 to 5,000 island homes are asked questions about their health which are used by researchers to calculate healthy life expectancy.

Public Health Jersey warned there was a "reasonable amount of uncertainty" in the calculation of healthy life expectancy because it used self-reported health status and could lead to over or under-estimation of the population's health.

It said the average healthy life expectancy for people aged 65 was 13.2 years.

Woman could expect an additional 14 years in good or very good health, while 65-year-old male islanders could expect another 12.3 years of good or very good health.

The figure has remained similar since 2016-18 for men and woman, researchers said.