Women's life expectancy began to increase around 1930 largely due to which factor?

• A. Increasing support for women's suffrage.
• B. Results of studies on women's health and well-being.
• C. Medical advances reducing deaths connected with pregnancy, childbirth, and infectious diseases.
• D. Greater supply of nutritional foods.

Answer: (C)

The key idea is that many women’s deaths in previous eras came from pregnancy, childbirth, and infectious diseases, so when medical care and public health improved in those areas, women stopped dying as often, and life expectancy rose. Advances in obstetric care reduced maternal mortality from complications like hemorrhage, infection, and obstructed labor. At the same time, better prevention and treatment of infectious diseases, along with improved sanitation and access to vaccines, lowered deaths from illnesses that commonly affected women. Because maternal deaths and infectious diseases accounted for a large share of deaths among women, these medical and public health improvements had a strong impact on the average length of life for women starting around that time. The other options describe important social or nutritional factors, but they don’t directly explain the sharp increase in life expectancy tied to health outcomes related to pregnancy, childbirth, and infection.