In 2021, Cyprus reported a decrease in life expectancy to 81.3 years, down from 82.4 years in the previous year, according to the latest data released by Eurostat on Monday.

Eurostat's data revealed that up until 2019, the European Union experienced a steady increase in life expectancy, reaching an average of 81.3 years at birth. However, the years 2020 and 2021 have seen a reversal of this trend with recorded declines.

Specifically for Cyprus, after a moderate yet steady rise, life expectancy peaked at 82.3 years in 2019. It remained virtually unchanged in 2020, but witnessed a reduction in 2021, aligning with the EU's overall trend of declining life expectancy.

Across the EU, the average life expectancy at birth in 2021 was 80.1 years. Women in the EU had a life expectancy of 82.9 years, outliving men by 5.7 years, who had a life expectancy of 77.2 years. This pattern of women living longer than men was consistent across all 242 NUTS 2 regions where data were available.

In Cyprus, life expectancy for women was 83.4 years in 2021, while men's life expectancy was 79.2 years—a difference of 4.2 years. 

Latvia exhibited the EU's largest life expectancy gender gap in 2021, with women outliving men by 9.8 years. Conversely, the French region of Mayotte showed the smallest gap, at 2.3 years.

The Spanish capital region of Comunidad de Madrid boasted the highest life expectancy for women at birth, an impressive 88.2 years, with five other Spanish regions closely following. Outside of Spain, France's Rhône-Alpes and Italy's Provincia Autonoma di Trento shared the next highest life expectancy for women, both at 86.7 years.

For men, the leading life expectancy at birth was in the autonomous region of Åland in Finland, with 82.8 years. Other regions with high life expectancies for men included Comunidad de Madrid in Spain with 82.2 years, and Stockholm and Småland med öarna in Sweden, both exceeding 81.9 years.