Local residents rest on the street in the old town of Salvador, in Salvador, Brazil, on Oct. 31, 2016. (Xinhua/Shen Hong)
Since 1940, average life expectancy in Brazil has risen by 30 years.
RIO DE JANEIRO, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- Brazil's average life expectancy rose to 76.3 years in 2018, the national statistics agency IBGE said on Thursday.
Average life expectancy for a Brazilian man born in 2018 was 72.8 years, up from 72.5 years in 2017, and for a woman, it was 79.9 years, up from 79.6 years in 2017, according to the agency's report.
The gender gap grows depending on the age bracket. For example, a Brazilian man aged 20-24 is 4.5 times less likely to reach his 25th birthday than a woman of the same age.
IBGE attributed the gap to the high mortality rate of Brazilian men due to homicide or traffic accidents.
"This phenomenon can be explained by the external, non-natural causes of death that affect the male population with more intensity," said IBGE researcher Marcio Minamiguchi.
"Starting in the mid-1980s, deaths linked to external causes have been highlighted. It is a phenomenon caused by urbanization and includes murders, traffic accidents and accidental falls," he said.
In addition to the gender gap, regional inequalities continued to be significant in Brazil.
While average life expectancy in Santa Catarina state, in the country's more prosperous south, was 79.7 years, in the poorer state of Maranhao, in the northeast, it dropped to 71.1 years, according to IBGE.
Since 1940, average life expectancy in Brazil has risen by 30 years, said the agency. ■
