2nd October, 2026
According to the UN health
agency’s latest Global
Health Estimates, life expectancy reached 73.3
years in 2023, just shy of the 73.4 years recorded in
2019.
“Living longer is one of the great
achievements of public health,” said Dr. Alain Labrique,
Director of WHO’s Department of
Data, Digital Health, Analytics and AI.
The estimates,
which cover trends in death and disability worldwide by
region and by country from 2000 to 2023, draw on various
sources including national vital registration data and
estimates from WHO technical programmes alongside UN partner
organizations.
Healthy life expectancy – the
years people live in good health – has recovered more
slowly, reaching 62.8 years in 2023, still 0.4 years below
its 2019 level.
“The next challenge is to
ensure that those additional years are lived in good health,
while health systems are equipped to respond to the changing
needs of populations,” Dr. Labrique said.
Milestone
for low-income countries
The estimates also point to
a long-term shift in what people die
from.
In 2023, for the first time,
communicable diseases – one that spreads from one person
or animal to another, or from a surface to a person –
accounted for less than half of all deaths in
low-income countries, a further step in what WHO
calls the “global epidemiological
transition”.
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Worldwide, noncommunicable
diseases (NCDs) caused 74 per cent of deaths in 2023, up
from 58 per cent in 2000, and eight of the
world’s 10 leading causes of death were
NCDs.
Cardiovascular diseases remain
the leading cause of death and disease burden. Ischaemic
heart disease alone caused approximately 9.5 million deaths
in 2023 and the loss of 210 million years of healthy
life.
Many parts of the world have made substantial
progress in reducing that burden since 2000, though
individual risk increased in Western Pacific and Southeast
Asia regions, highlighting persistent
inequalities.
Rising burden of dementia
Other
chronic conditions are becoming more prominent.
Dementia rose from the 19th leading cause
of death globally in 2000 to the fifth in 2023, with deaths
from the condition tripling over the period.
The risk
of dying from diabetes has also risen
substantially since 2000, particularly in South-East
Asia.
Between 2019 and 2023, the global
age-standardised rate of “healthy life” lost
rose by about 20 per cent for depressive disorders and
nearly 45 per cent for anxiety disorders.
For
drug use disorders, the Americas recorded
the largest increases in risk of death and healthy life lost
between 2000 and 2023, while the Western Pacific saw
substantial declines.
Diagnosis points to
cure
“The value of these estimates is not only in
the numbers themselves,” Dr. Labrique said. “By showing
how causes of death and disease burden are changing over
time and across populations, they give countries
evidence to help shape health policies and
priorities.”
