Coronavirus

Brazil life expectancy up to 77 after pandemic dip

Brazil life expectancy up to 77 after pandemic dip
Photo: Juliana F. Rodrigues/Shutterstock

The average life expectancy at birth in Brazil was 77 years in 2021, according to the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE). 

This comes as some relief to the country, as the devastation of the Covid pandemic in 2020 was so profound that it caused the first drop since World War II.

The health crisis reduced average Brazilian life expectancy by 1.94 years in 2020, with the drop even more pronounced in some states. In Brasília, Amazonas, Amapá, Roraima, and Espírito Santo, people were expected to live three years shorter than 2019 averages. Life expectancy in Amazonas was set to hit 73 in 2020, but it ended up as just 69.5 years.

While it is normal for longevity to fall amid a health crisis of the proportions of Covid, there were fears among experts that Brazil would take some time to recover from the pandemic in statistical terms.

However, the decreasing lethality of new variants and subvariants has allowed the health system to stand firm.