Schizophrenia is a mental disorder that affects how a person behaves, thinks, and sees the world. It can majorly impact a person's daily life, making it difficult to keep relationships. Common symptoms of schizophrenia include disorganized speech, disturbances in thinking, withdrawal from society, erratic behavior, deluded thinking, and seeing, tasting, or hearing things that aren't there.
People with this psychiatric disorder may not identify what is real or hallucinated. Schizophrenia can also interfere with regular activities such as attending meetings and engaging in conversations. Treatment for schizophrenia includes therapy, counseling, lifestyle changes, and medication to reduce symptoms.
Key takeaways
- People with schizophrenia have a shorter average life expectancy than the general population, although individual outcomes vary.
- Physical illnesses, health behaviors, treatment-related risks, and suicide contribute to the mortality gap.
- Coordinated physical and mental healthcare, health education, and self-management support can improve well-being and reduce preventable risks.
How long do people with schizophrenia live on average?
Schizophrenia is associated with a shorter average life expectancy, although estimates vary by population and study. WHO’s September 2026 fact sheet reports that people with schizophrenia die about nine years earlier than the general population.
Physical conditions, including cardiovascular, metabolic, and infectious illnesses, contribute to this gap. These are population averages, not a prediction of how long any individual will live[1].
Why do people with schizophrenia have a lower life expectancy?
Extrapolation of health study results from the general population to schizophrenic patients may not be appropriate. From a genetic perspective, schizophrenia may alter disease risk, conferring disadvantages in some areas and advantages in others.
In addition, optimal treatment for patients with schizophrenia may require a compromise between mental and physical health. Despite the significant advances in treatment and medical care, improved understanding of schizophrenia, and advocacy efforts focused on this population, individuals with schizophrenia:
- Remain at elevated risk for serious cardiovascular disease, including heart attacks. This risk can be up to ten times greater than their peers without schizophrenia due to various risk factors such as the greater prevalence of unhealthy lifestyle choices, inadequate preventative health services, poor disease management, and more significant comorbidities associated with the severe mental illness itself[2].
- Suffer from other comorbidities, such as metabolic diseases, including diabetes and elevated lipids.
- Can present medical conditions that increase the risk for premature mortality in patientswith schizophrenia, such as low birth weight, an associated cause of the mental health condition.
- May not receive the necessary treatment or understand the interactions and complications that can come from underlying disorders.
- Experience medication side effects from drugs they need to keep their mental illness under control. This is problematic in this demographic, contributing to many barriers to optimal care.
- Smoke at significantly higher rates than the general public. One study found that 48% of individuals with a serious mental illness, defined as either schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, were smokers[3]. Not surprisingly, this can lead to other problems, such as an increased risk of developing a wide range of secondary illnesses, shorter life expectancy, and economic consequences due to additional medical costs.
- Have an increased risk of suicideor experiencing an accidental death. Various studies suggest these individuals are 40% more likely to die in this way than the general population.
These points underline this mental illness's severity and demonstrate the importance of providing sufferers with the proper support[4].
Subject matter expert
Clinical social work and chronic mental illness
View profileHow to manage schizophrenia to improve your life expectancy
Self-management interventions aim at empowering individuals to manage their own health. They should be prioritized along with standard care to improve function, quality of life, and life expectancy. These include:
- Education about their mental illness and treatment to make informed decisions on interventions and care
- Awareness of health risks associated with schizophrenia to allow them to watch for signs of disease, get check-ups, and emphasize the importance of a healthy lifestyle when possible
- Skills to recognize warning signs of relapse and episodes requiring medical attention
- Coping skills (through therapy) for dealing with symptoms that persist
- Setting personal goals to improve the sense of hope[5]
It is our obligation as a society to do more to protect the health of people with schizophrenia by providing culturally and linguistically competent healthcare services and better public education to promote healthy behaviors among this population[1].
