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"The biggest result is that ... at least one group is going to break the 90-year barrier," said Majid Ezzati, professor of global environmental health at Imperial College London, referring to the predictions among South Korean women. Ezzati led the study and highlighted that many experts had believed the average would never exceed 90.

"This shows that even if there is a limit to longevity, we are nowhere near it," he said. "We should be planning for more life."



Among predictions for high-income countries, the lowest life expectancy at birth is likely to be in the US, with an average of 83.3 years for women and 79.5 years for men -- similar to Mexico and Croatia.

"They still have relatively high rates of young and middle-age mortality," Ezzati told CNN, referring to the countries with lower life expectancies. "People have a relatively high risk of dying in their 40s or 50s."



"A lot of this is driven by inequality, (which) brings down the national average," Ezzati said.


In contrast, greater equality, more comprehensive health care and healthy diets and lifestyles embedded in a culture can bring this up -- as with South Korea.

"Places like South Korea and some emerging economies, Switzerland and Canada do very well," Ezzati said. "South Korea has had remarkable success."

Ezzati believes the secret to South Korea's success has been the country's investment in childhood nutrition, education and technology as well as low blood pressure, low levels of smoking and good access to health care.

"An equitable way of taking up this knowledge has been the driver," he said.

Meanwhile, countries like Japan, long revered for their longevity, are expected to see just small increases in life expectancy. "The Japanese story has started to come to an end," Ezzati said, adding that while the Japanese culture is known for healthy diets and active lifestyles, "that's beginning to change."

"They still have low obesity and low blood pressure ... and are still doing well, but some things are catching up," he said, highlighting Western influences such as diet.

"South Korea has caught up with Japan as its standard of living has increased," said Sarah Harper, professor of gerontology at the University of Oxford. "But in many parts of Asia, young people are eating Western diets. ... The (previously) healthy diet may not be sustained as young people reach older ages."

The findings are hoped to help countries learn healthy changes by example and, more important, to help policymakers prepare for their populations' changing demographics.

"What South Korea has done goes completely against some Western countries ... against the prosperity agenda," Ezzati said, adding that we need to think about "social care, planning and pensions in an aging population."

Harper, said the new projections are, "very much in line with what other projections are showing." She agreed that countries in Asia are leading the way but are also seeing change among their younger population.

She further agreed that inequality is likely to be an underlying factor for why some high-income countries are seeing lower life expectancy predictions. "The US spends more of its budget on health care than any other country in the world. Some say this is due to the huge amount of inequality," she said. "The Scandinavian countries do well. ... They're counted as more equal and tend to have higher life expectancy outcomes."