The Human Mortality Database (HMD) The Human Mortality
Database (HMD) was created to provide detailed mortality and population data
to researchers, students, journalists, policy analysts, and others
interested in the history of human longevity. It is an outgrowth of the
earlier Berkeley Mortality Database (BMD), and is co-sponsored by UC
Berkeley (with funding from the NIA) and the Max Planck Institute for
Demographic Research, located in Rostock, Germany. The HMD currently
provides detailed population and mortality data for 37 countries or areas.
Speakers: John Wilmoth, Magali Barbieri and Carl Boe
John Wilmoth is a Professor in the Department of Demography, an affiliated
faculty member in Sociology, and a researcher in the Berkeley's Center on
the Economics and Demography of Aging. Much of his research concerns the
enormous increase in human longevity that has occurred during the past 250
years, and includes work on the causes of the historical mortality decline,
future trends in human mortality and life expectancy, variations in
mortality over the life course and among social groups, and exceptional
longevity and possible limits to the human life span. This research included
a special emphasis on developing better sources of information about
historical patterns and trends in human mortality and life expectancy.
