Life expectancy of Irish men increases, new statistics show

Men in Ireland are narrowing the survival gap with women, says this story on irishhealth.com on new statistics from the Central Statistics Office..

The figures show that the life expectancy of males has increased to 80 years, while women can still look forward to three years more, the story says.

Statistics on people aged 65 in 2001-2003 show that men can expect to live another 15.4 years on average, with women likely to live another 18.7 years.

Ageing in Ireland, the latest set of figures from the Central Statistics Office, shows that about 11% of the Irish population was aged 65 or over last year, a total of 467,900 individuals.

The CSO says that the old dependency rate (the number of older people, presumed to be retired, against younger people in the workforce) could increase by as much as 16% in 2006 to 25% in 2026 for Ireland, and from 25% to 37% for the EU. That means there would be one elderly person in Ireland for every four people aged between 15 and 64.

Men aged 65 & over in Ireland had a much higher rate of employment than the EU average, 14% compared to 7%. The difference for women was less marked (4% compared to EU rate of 3%).

The types of work older people do are quite different. Nearly half the men aged 65 & over (49%) who were employed worked in the agriculture, forestry and fishing sector, compared to 13% of women. But the proportion of older working women who are employed in the health sector was 23%, compared to only 2% of men…..