It is crucial to have accurate estimates of future life expectancy to inform social security, pension, and insurance schemes, public policies, and healthcare planning. However, estimates of future mortality are often inaccurate because they are based on simple extrapolations of past trends. Consequently, they neglect the long-term impacts of ‘lifestyle epidemics’, such as smoking, alcohol, and obesity, which also differ across sexes, generations, and countries. In addition, current estimates do not incorporate the delay in ageing, meaning that the 90-year-olds of today roughly resemble the 80-year-olds of the past.
In this project, we aim to improve future mortality estimates for Europe by developing a novel projection methodology which integrates to-be-generated insights on past mortality trends about (a) the impact of the ‘epidemics’ of smoking, alcohol, and obesity on mortality trends; and (b) the shifts in the age-at-death distribution.
More information on the project is available on the project website: www.futuremortality.com. This project is funded by a VIDI grant from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO).
