Life expectancy in Mozambique, estimated at 43.5 years in 1999, is among the lowest in the world. The 1998 Regional Human Development Report (RHDR) estimated that life expectancy in the other 13 member countries of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) in 1995 varied between 72 years in the Seychelles and, at the other extreme, 41 years in Malawi (UNDP-SADC-SARIPS, 1998: Table 1).

Life expectancy at birth is one of the main indicators used to measure the well-being of a population, and is one of the three variables used to determine a country's Human Development Index, alongside per capita income and educational level. HIV/AIDS attacks all three indicators directly or indirectly. Life expectancy in Mozambique is declining and within ten years it could be cut by a third because of HIV/AIDS.

However, as was shown in the 1999 report, life expectancy is an indicator which varies substantially from region to region within Mozambique, in accordance with the stage of development. The region with the highest life expectancy is the South - 46.5 years for men and 53.4 years for women. The North is the region with the lowest life expectancy - 41.1 years for women, and 39.2 years for men. In the Centre, life expectancy is 38.8 years for men and 41.6 years for women. (UNDP, 1999: 25)

The low and differentiated life expectancy in the various regions of Mozambique is partly explained by asymmetries in economic development, the poor and differentiated coverage of the health services resulting from the combined effect of the colonial legacy and the armed conflict. The regions with low life expectancy and fragile human development are also those which have the highest indices of seroprevalence.

The reduction of life expectancy in Mozambique because of HIV/AIDS is in line with the trend noted in other countries (graph 4.2). Life expectancy in Zimbabwe, for instance, fell from 53.4 to 44 years in a period of just three years (from 1996 to 1999), while in Botswana life expectancy fell from 65.2 to 47.4 years in the same period, with a negative impact on classification in the world ranking based on HDI (UNDP, 1998).