Life Expectancy at Birth (2016)
  – Male: 80.9; Female: 84.7; Both Genders: 82.8
Maternal Mortality Ratio (per 100,000 live births) (2015): 7
Neonatal Mortality Rate (per 1,000 live births) (2017): 4
Probability of Dying from any of Cardiovascular Disease, Cancer, Diabetes, Chronic Respiratory Diseases Between Age 30 and Exact Age 70 (%) (2017):
  – Male: 11.5%; Female: 8.1%; Both Genders: 9.8%

Source: World health statistics 2019: monitoring health for the SDGs, sustainable development goals. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2019. Licence: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.

Neonatal Mortality Rate (Deaths Per 1,000 Live Births) (2018): 3
Infant Mortality Rate (Deaths Per 1,000 Live Births) (2018): 4
Under-5 Mortality Rate (Deaths Per 1,000 Live Births) (2018):
  Male: 5; Female: 5

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.”

Source: UNICEF (2019). The State of the World’s Children 2019. Children, Food and Nutrition: Growing well in a changing world. UNICEF, New York.

“Life expectancy in Canada increased steadily until 2016, and is relatively high compared with most OECD countries at 81.9 years. Since 1995, life expectancy at birth in Canada increased by 4 years but it plateaued between 2016 and 2017 due in large part to the opioid crisis. Although the infant mortality rate has decreased since 1995, at 4.5 deaths per 1 000 births, it is higher than in Australia, France and Sweden.”

Source: Marchildon G.P., Allin S., Merkur S. Canada: Health system review. Health Systems in Transition, 2020; 22(3): i–194.

“Multiple indicators demonstrate that the health status of Indigenous peoples in Canada is well below the Canadian average in spite of some improvements in recent years. A significant gap in life expectancy remains between First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples, and non-Indigenous Canadians, and the gap has persisted between 1996 and 2011 (Tjepkema et al., 2019). In 2011, the gap in life expectancy at age 1 year was highest between Inuit and non-Indigenous Canadians (11 years), followed by First Nations (9–10 years), and Métis peoples (4.5–5 year gap). Suicide rates among First Nations people, Métis and Inuit were significantly higher than the rate for non-Indigenous Canadians between 2011 and 2016, with the highest rates seen among Inuit and in particular among young people (Kumar & Tjepkema, 2019). First Nations people living on reserves also experience a much higher incidence of physical injuries than the Canadian average. For example, Guèvremont et al. (2017) analysed national data (excluding Quebec) that linked the census to hospital records and found significantly higher acute care hospitalization rates among Indigenous children and youth compared with non-Indigenous children and youth, with highest rates among First Nations children living on reserves and Inuit youth. There are some signs of a reduction in inequality in hospitalizations, with a steeper decline in the rate of injury hospitalization among Indigenous peoples in British Columbia compared with the total population in that province (George et al., 2015). Although Inuit populations are less affected by some chronic conditions, due in part to more traditional and less sedentary lives (Garner et al., 2015), they face significantly higher rates of tuberculosis, infant mortality, food insecurity and suicide than the general population (Inuit Tapirit Kanatami, 2018). As with Indigenous populations in other OECD countries such as Australia and the USA, the causes of these health disparities have long historical roots in colonization that has resulted in economic and social marginalization, intergenerational trauma, along with enormous long-lasting negative health impacts (Waldrum, Herring & Young, 2006; Mitrou et al., 2014).”

Source: Marchildon G.P., Allin S., Merkur S. Canada: Health system review. Health Systems in Transition, 2020; 22(3): i–194.

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 several other nations.

Page last updated April 3, 2021 by Doug McVay, Editor.