Recent mortality trends in China

Analysing and understanding Chinas demographic patterns and trends must start with an appreciation of its extraordinary mortality changes over the past six decades. This transition can be divided broadly into two stages: very rapid mortality decline from the early 1950s to the late 1970s, and slower but still appreciable improvement in the next three decades. In the fi rst period, Chinas life expectancy improved at an average speed of 10 years per decade. While Chinas life expectancy at birth was only around 35 years in the late 1940s, it rose signifi cantly to 50 in 1957, 61 in 1970 and 65 in 1981 (Banister 1987 ). This change not only brought about a rapid population growth, but also laid foundation for an equally remarkable fertility transition later. This great achievement was directly attributable to a series of socio-economic transformations and public health campaigns and programs, such as nationwide land reform, establishment of government controlled food redistribution, effective control and prevention of infectious disease, rural cooperative medical system and urban free medical care, widespread primary education, and nationwide family planning program.