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Life Expectancy at Birth, 2022: 84.82
Infant Mortality Rate, 2022 (per 1,000 live births): 1.68
Under-Five Mortality Rate, 2022 (per 1,000 live births): 2.35

Source: United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2023). Data Portal, custom data acquired via website. United Nations: New York. Accessed 12 May 2023.

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Life Expectancy at Birth (2019): 84.3
Maternal Mortality Ratio (per 100,000 live births) (2017): 5
Neonatal Mortality Rate (per 1,000 live births) (2020): <1
Probability of Dying from any of Cardiovascular Disease, Cancer, Diabetes, Chronic Respiratory Diseases Between Age 30 and Exact Age 70 (%) (2019): 8.3%

Source: World health statistics 2022: monitoring health for the SDGs, sustainable development
goals. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2022. Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.

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Neonatal Mortality Rate, 2021: 1
Infant Mortality Rate, 2021: 2
Under-5 Mortality Rate, 2021: 2
Maternal Mortality Ratio, 2020: 4

Note: “Under-5 mortality rate – Probability of dying between birth and exactly 5 years of age, expressed per 1,000 live births.
“Infant mortality rate – Probability of dying between birth and exactly 1 year of age, expressed per 1,000 live births.
“Neonatal mortality rate – Probability of dying during the first 28 days of life, expressed per 1,000 live births.”
“Maternal mortality ratio – Number of deaths of women from pregnancy-related causes per 100,000 live births during the same time period (modelled estimates).”

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Maternal Deaths Per 100,000 Live Births, 2020: 4

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“Life expectancy at birth increased between 1990 and 2015 by 4.0 years for men and 4.5 years for women, reaching 80.5 years and 86.8 years, respectively (Nomura S et al., 2017). However, regional disparities have widened during the same period. The gap between the highest and lowest life expectancy among prefectures increased from 2.5 years in 1990 to 3.1 years in 2015.

“Healthy life expectancy at birth, the average number of years that a newborn can expect to live in full health, rose from 70.4 years in 1990 to 73.9 years for both sexes in 2015. In 2015, healthy life expectancy was 71.5 years for men and 76.3 years for women. The gap between life expectancy at birth and healthy life expectancy at birth observed in 1990 has been static until 2015. All-cause age-standardized mortality rates for both sexes decreased by 29.0% between 1990 and 2015, falling from 584.1 deaths per 100 000 people in 1990 to 414.8 deaths per 100 000 people in 2015. Prefecture-level reductions in age-standardized mortality rates varied from 22.0% in Okinawa to 32.4% in Shiga between 1990 and 2015.

“There have been significant improvements in life expectancy over the past 35 years in all OECD countries, as shown in Table 1.4. According to OECD data, of the 12 high-income OECD countries, Japan has the highest life expectancy at 83.7 years in 2015. This longevity compared to other OECD countries has been sustained over time. Among other OECD countries, Italy (82.7 years) has the second longest life expectancy followed by France (82.4 years) and Korea (82.3 years). The lowest life expectancy among OECD countries was observed in Mexico (76.7 years). The contributing factors to the relatively long life expectancy in Japan may be attributable to a healthy lifestyle, diets and other risk factor profiles, sanitation and hygiene, universal and equitable health coverage and social determinants (Horiuchi S, 2011; Ikeda N et al., 2011).”

Source: Sakamoto H, Rahman M, Nomura S, Okamoto E, Koike S, Yasunaga H et al. Japan Health System Review. Vol. 8 No. 1. New Delhi: World Health Organization, Regional Office for South-East Asia, 2018.

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World Health Systems Facts is a project of the Real Reporting Foundation. We provide reliable statistics and other data from authoritative sources regarding health systems in the US and sixteen other nations.

Page last updated September 25, 2023 by Doug McVay, Editor.