Michel Guillot

After one year of conflict, life expectancy in the Gaza Strip has been cut almost in half. INED senior researcher Michel Guillot explains the methodology used to arrive at this conclusion. 

(Interview conducted in February 2025)

We estimate that life expectancy at birth in the Gaza Strip has fallen by nearly half since the start of the war. Life expectancy has plummeted, from 75.5 years before the war to an estimated 40.5 years during the first 12 months of the war—a fall of nearly 35 years, or 46%. Moreover, we have reason to think these figures underestimate real life expectancy losses in this territory because they do not account for the war’s indirect effects on mortality. Nor do they account for the likely underestimation of the number of persons killed. Life expectancy losses have been greater among men (-38 years) but are also very high among women (-30 years).

Men aged 15-64 account for approximately 46% of the dead. This means that the majority of victims—54%—are women, children, and older persons. Children under 15, taken alone, account for 27% of those victims. 36% are women.

The Gaza health ministry was counting victims under difficult conditions. However, it did manage to publish victim lists, indicating the name, sex, date of birth, and identity card number for each of the dead. The most recent list we were able to access was dated August 30, 2024. To proceed with our study, we verified that the individuals listed as victims were also on UNRWA’s population registry, which covers persons with refugee status, i.e., approximately 66% of the population of Gaza. After cross-checking in this way, we concluded that the list did not show any signs of having been “inflated” by the Health Ministry—on the contrary, the number of victims on it appears to have been underestimated, as shown by another study published in The Lancet. 

That question is beyond the scope of demography and the boundaries of our study. However, our results do show that men are not the only ones whose life expectancies at various ages have fallen. Women’s life expectancy overall has also fallen dramatically—by approximately 30 years. And 27% of the dead were children under age 15. This explains why life expectancy losses have been both so heavy and so general—the entire population of Gaza has been affected. And again, this is not a complete or definitive assessment as it does not account for the indirect effects of the war. We expect to see even heavier falls in life expectancy once information on indirectly caused deaths is available and taken into account. 

Source : Michel Guillot, Mohammed Draidi, Valeria Cetorelli, José H C Monteiro Da Silva, Ismail Lubbad, Life expectancy losses in the Gaza Strip during the period October, 2023, to September, 2024, The Lancet [en ligne]. 23 janvier 2025. DOI 10.1016/S0140-6736(24)02810-1