Challenges and Opportunities in Collecting Individual Data for the International Database on Longevity (IDL)

Svitlana Poniakina , Insitut National D'Études Démographiques
Arianna Caporali, Institut National d'Études Démographiques (INED)
France Meslé, Institut National d'Études Démographiques (INED)
Jean-Marie Robine, Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM)
Jacques Vallin, Institut National d'Études Démographiques (INED)
Carlo Giovanni Camarda, Institut National d'Études Démographiques (INED)

The International Database on Longevity (IDL) is a collaborative project supported by an international network of researchers, and managed by the DataLab at the French Institute for Demographic Studies (INED). IDL compiles thoroughly validated data on deceased semi-supercentenarians (at age 105-109 years old) and supercentenarians (over 110 years old) currently in thirteen countries. It is designed to study the limits of longevity and the mortality hazard at the oldest ages. Over time, the IDL has encountered a notable reduction in the number of countries willing to provide their data, which is primarily attributed to certain countries' reluctance to disclose individual records due to legal protections and privacy concerns. In Europe, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has harmonized the legal framework about the treatment and dissemination of personal data. However, it does not apply to data on deceased individuals, which remain subject to national regulations. To address this issue, we propose to provide access to aggregated data rather than individual data when a country is reluctant to provide individual records. We expect that this will encourage more countries to contribute to the IDL database. The paper describes the aggregation method that we want to implement. It consists in aggregating individual data at the level of the Lexis triangles. This approach allows both period and cohort analyses, thus ensuring that through IDL data it will continue to be possible to perform high quality data analyses aimed at studying longevity.

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 Presented in Session P3. Migration, Economics, Policies, History