still, it is clear that *adult* mortality rates have declined with industrialization and modernization ['progress'], as have *infant* mortality rates. people did die at younger ages inthe olden daze; not all can be explained by decreased infant mortality rates. an indicator of that is the fact that more US children in 1890 lived in a single parent family due to death than they do now due to divorce!
for example: in 1870 only 37% of women born in 1870 survived to age 65. [surely the 63% can't be entirely explained by infant/child morality] in 1930 77% of women born in 1930 reached the age of 65.
also, rakesh, princeton has a huge database and houses an archive of papers on comparisons of various indicators of mortality, LE, and health, etc. something like the institute for population research, not sure.
k
>Since 1980, life expectancy has improved by 6%. There has been a 21%
>reduction in infant mortality, a 37% reduction in under five mortality,
>and a 15% decrease in adult mortality for both women and men. There are no
>aggregate statistics for the reduction in child mortality which seems to
>have moved downward the least of all. This is very troubling since it can
>be argued that nothing better guages the functioning of the health
>monitoring system than children's health. Much of the reduction in
>infant mortality and under five mortality rates could be the result of the
>poor having fewer children as they are urbanized, while the reduction in
>adult mortality could be enjoyed disproportionately by the better off
>classes. The lives of the adult poor may well remain brutish and short.
>
>Yours, Rakesh
>
>
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