Rome, April 8 - Italy's life expectancy at birth continues to rise, reaching 83.4 years in 2024, cementing the country's status as one of the world's longest-lived. This is what Istat writes in the report "Health: a Conquest to Defend", which reconstructs the trajectory of longevity in Italy and shows, in addition to progress, new health and social criticalities associated with population aging. Between 1990 and 2024, men's life expectancy increased by roughly 8 years and women's by 6.5 years, to 81.5 and 85.6 years, respectively. However, significant territorial inequalities persist: in 2023, the median age at death was 81.6 years for men and 86.3 years for women, with values ranging from less than 82 in Campania to more than 86 in the Marche region. According to Istat, one of the most significant reasons contributing to the increase in longevity has been the substantial decline in newborn mortality. In 2023, the mortality rate in the first year of life was 2.7 fatalities per thousand live births, one of the lowest levels globally, compared to 230 per thousand in the nineteenth century. Improvements in cleanliness and food circumstances, medical advancement, vaccination dissemination, and, following 1978, the unification of the national health system all had a role. However, since people live longer lives, there is a growth in chronic-degenerative diseases and multimorbidity, which is the coexistence of two or more diseases in the same person and already affects 13 million people in Italy. Istat highlights the growing burden of cancer and cardiovascular disease, which are now among the leading causes of death, as well as the expansion of diabetes and hypertension, which is aided not just by population aging but also by poor lifestyle choices. Despite this picture, people's subjective perceptions of their health improve. In the last thirty years, the percentage of people who identify themselves to be in bad health has decreased from 8% in 1995 to 5.5% in 2025. The greatest significant improvements are observed in senior age groups, indicating that increased lifespan is accompanied, at least in part, by a higher quality of life.