Mortality dierentials among women: the Israel Longitudinal Mortality Study Orly Manor a, *, Zvi Eisenbach b , Avi Israeli a , Yechiel Friedlander a a School of Public Health and Community Medicine, The Hebrew University-Hadassah Medical Organization, Ein Karem, Israel b Department of Population Studies, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel Abstract The ®rst aim of this study was to examine dierentials in mortality among Israeli adult women with respect to ethnic origin, marital status, number of children and several measures of socio-economic status; the second was to compare mortality dierentials among women with those found for Israeli men. Data are based on a linkage of records from a 20% sample of the 1983 census with the records of deaths occurring until the end of 1992. The study population includes 79,623 women and the number of deaths was 14,332. Measures of SES included education, number of rooms, household amenities and possession of a car. Results indicated higher mortality among women originating from North Africa compared with Asian and European women. Adjustment to SES eliminated the excess mortality among North African women and revealed a lower mortality of Asian women, relative to Europeans. Among women aged 45±69, substantial and consistent mortality dierentials were evident for all SES indicators examined where mortality declined with improved socio-economic position. Mortality was related to women`s childbearing history, with the highest mortality among childless women. Mortality dierentials among women aged 70+ were generally narrower than those found for younger women. Gender dierences in mortality dierentials varied by the socio-demographic indicator and age. 7 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Mortality dierentials; Women; SES; Gender; Israel Introduction In the industrialized world socio-economic status (SES) mortality dierentials have been documented and analyzed extensively (Marmot, Shipley & Rose, 1984a; Sorlie, Backund & Keller, 1995; Kunst, Groen- hof & Mackenbach, 1998). Frequently, such analyses have focused on male inequalities (Macintyre & Hunt, 1997; Kunst et al., 1998). Studies, which address women, indicate that SES inequalities exist for women as well (Moser, Pugh & Goldblatt, 1988; Martelin, 1994; Sorlie et al., 1995, Arber, 1997). However, there is some evidence that the magnitude of SES inequal- ities dier, with women having smaller dierentials than men (Valkonen, 1989; Blane, Davey Smith & Bartley, 1990; Koskinen & Martelin, 1994; Elo & Pre- ston, 1996). One of the main indicators of social position used for investigating mortality dierentials has been occu- pation. However, women`s labor market experience, while varying among industrialized countries, is fre- Social Science & Medicine 51 (2000) 1175±1188 0277-9536/00/$ - see front matter 7 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S0277-9536(00)00024-1 www.elsevier.com/locate/socscimed * Corresponding author. Tel.: +972-2-6758519; fax: +972- 2-6435083. E-mail address: om@cc.huji.ac.il (O. Manor).