Introduction

The Canadian Human Mortality Database (CHMD) was created to provide detailed Canadian mortality and population data to researchers, students, journalists, policy analysts, and others interested in the history of human longevity. The project is an achievement of the Mortality and Longevity research team at the Department of Demography, Université de Montréal, under the joint direction of Professors Robert Bourbeau and Nadine Ouellette. The project is also carried out in collaboration with demographers at the Max Plank Institute for Demographic Research (Rostock, Germany) and the Department of Demography, University of California, Berkeley (United States). The CHMD is a “satellite” of the Human Mortality Database (HMD), an international database which currently holds detailed data for 41 countries or regions. Consequently, the CHMD’s underlying methodology corresponds to the one used for the HMD. Some adjustments were made to adapt to the unique situation of some Canadian provinces and the territories.

The CHMD gathers all required data (deaths counts, births counts, population size, exposure-to-risk, death rates) to compute life tables for Canada, its provinces and its territories. One of the great advantages of the database is to include data that is validated and corrected, when required, and made comparable, as much as possible, for the period ranging from 1921 thru 2021. For comparison purposes, various life tables published by governmental organizations are also available for download in the Archives section.