Period life expectancy is calculated from age-specific death rates using life table methods that are among the oldest and most widely employed tools of demography. These methods are rarely questioned, much less criticized. Yet changing age patterns of adult mortality in countries with high life...

In June 2000, an estimated 25 percent of adults in Zimbabwe were living with HIV/AIDS. Statistical data on the impact of the epidemic, though problematic in many ways, are better for Zimbabwe than for many other countries in sub-Saharan Africa. This analysis presents estimates of adult mortality...