SA life expectancy worse than Iraq

November 14 2008 at 06:03AM

The life expectancy of South Africans is lower than the average in
Africa and that of war-ravaged Iraq, a UN Population Fund report showed.
The data is contained in a report on the state of the world population
in 2008 which was released by the United Nations Population Fund on Tuesday.
Beeld newspaper reported that, worldwide, men are expected to live until
65 and women until almost 70.
But in Africa, men are expected to live until 52 and women until 54.
In South Africa, the life expectancy for men is 49 and for women 50.
In Iraq, those figures are 58 and 62 for men and women respectively.
The report also showed that the number of illiterate South African men
is more than double than those in Zimbabwe.
Illiteracy among South African men over 15-years-old is 16 percent as
opposed to 7 percent in Zimbabwe, Beeld said. - Sapa