some of the countries in this list have had some of the smallest outbreaks, so pointing to life expectancy doesn't reflect on mitigation efficacy, or lack thereof. further, it's worth noting that neither the united states (which has had a lot of dead people) nor china (which hasn't, or at least hasn't officially) are in this list because they both have relatively low life expectancy; china's is under 77, and the united states' is under 78, and apparently declining. i've pointed out a few times that the united states also has a very serious problem with diabetes and obesity.
however, it is to be expected that the size of an outbreak should be proportional to the size of the very elderly population, something that was sort of hinted at when the numbers started coming out of italy, and is kind of being confirmed as they come out of other places.
it's just one factor. but, realize this: there simply aren't as many very old people in china as there are elsewhere, and there are a lot of old people in most of europe. it's not the only thing, but it's probably going to turn out to actually be a pretty big thing.
ideally, a country would be able to keep it out of the geriatric facilities.
but, if they can't, it causes havoc....and the more old people there are to start, the more dead people there are in the end.
so, when you see numbers like this from sweden:
....you shouldn't be that surprised.
sweden is much larger but otherwise not very different from norway. however, it has substantively higher life expectancy than denmark (which is 31 in the list) and is even a good distance from finland, statistically. iceland is an island, and should be treated as an outlier.
certainly, sweden is doing very well, in comparison to italy, spain and france.
and, has it peaked? the update is that it's looking more and more like it has, yes.