Life Expectancy at Birth and Infant Mortality Rates of Indigenous Populations in Canada from 2004 to 2016

Abstract

Life expectancy and infant mortality rates are two important indicators of the well-being of a population. However, it is not possible to compute these indicators for specific Indigenous populations in Canada from vital statistics databases because information about the identity of individuals is lacking. We use alternative data sources, linkages between the long-form census questionnaire and the Canadian Vital Statistics, namely the Canadian Census Health and Environment Cohorts and the Canadian Birth Census Cohorts, to compute life expectancy at birth and infant mortality rates among Indigenous populations. We describe the data, explain the methodology, and analyze the results to demonstrate the usefulness of these databases for the regular reporting of these health outcomes and monitoring of trends.