TRAMES 3, 4, 2000

LONG-TERM MORTALITY TREND IN THE BALTIC COUNTRIES

Kalev Katus

Estonian Interuniversity Population Research Centre

Abstract. Being part of the collaborative research project of French and Baltic demographers aimed at comparative analysis of mortality in the Baltic countries, the paper concentrates on long-term mortality development in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Considering the need for reconstruction of continuous mortality indicators, the paper discusses principal sources of relevant data in the three Baltic countries, particularly the input for calculation of the new set of annual life tables. The analysis is mainly based on the new set of reconstructed life-tables of 1897-1998, supplemented by the dynamics of more simple indicators for the previous decades. The long-term mortality development in all Baltic countries could be roughly divided into two large periods: mortality decrease up to the early 1960s, and the following stagnation period during the following four decades. Furthermore, the mortality stagnation could be characterised not only by the absence of progress in mortality levels but more importantly by the deterioration in age-specific mortality.

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