Australians are outliving people from other high-income English-speaking countries, a study suggests.
People from Australia have a lower death rate for certain cancers, and from heart and lung diseases, researchers say.
They also have fewer deaths from drugs or alcohol.
The study, published in the journal BMJ Open, examined life expectancies in Australia compared with the U.K., Ireland, the United States, Canada and New Zealand.
The researchers from the University of Southern California and Pennsylvania State University in the U.S. concluded Australia is the "clear best performer" when it comes to life expectancy at birth.
They found that, in 2018, baby girls in Australia could expect to live for up to four years longer than their peers in the other countries studied.
Baby boys might live for almost five years longer.
The academics said Australia has a four- to five-year life expectancy advantage over the U.S. and a one- to 2.5-year advantage over Canada, New Zealand, Ireland and the U.K..
"Australia has achieved the highest life expectancy among Anglophone countries and tends to rank well in international comparisons of life expectancy overall," the authors wrote.
"Australia performs particularly well in terms of mortality from external causes (including drug- and alcohol-related deaths), screenable/treatable cancers, cardiovascular disease and influenza/pneumonia and other respiratory diseases compared with other countries."
In midlife — the 45 to 64 age range — some of these causes continue, like high death rates from drug- and alcohol-related mortality, Ho explained, adding that Americans also see higher rates of cardiovascular disease mortality.
“Some of the latter could be related to sedentary lifestyle, high rates of obesity, unhealthy diet, stress and a history of smoking,” she said.
“It’s likely that these patterns of unhealthy behaviours put Americans at a disadvantage in terms of their health and vitality.”
Australia offers the U.S. a model for improving its life expectancy, Ho added. Like the U.S., Australia is large in terms of land area and has a comparable history of personal vehicle ownership.
The two countries have some cultural similarities, including historically greater use of firearms. However, Australia implemented a number of policies in recent decades including gun law reforms that helped vault them to the top of the life expectancy rankings.
“What the study shows is that a peer country like Australia far outperforms the U.S. and was able to get its young adult mortality under control,” Ho said.
“It has really low levels of gun deaths and homicides, lower levels of drug and alcohol use and better performance on chronic diseases, the latter of which points to lifestyle factors, health behaviours and health care performance.”
With AAP.
