Life expectancy of males in the Republic, a small postcommunist country in Central is among the lowest in Europe due to the extremely high mortality rate in middle-aged men.

The relation between male life expectancy at age 20 and several variables (i.e. ethnic structure, educational status, religious belief and economic activity) was analysed by simple regressions and by multifactorial methods in all 38 districts of Slovakia.

Significant negative associations were found between male life expectancy at age 20 and ethnic structure (i.e. percent of Hungarian population), economic activity (percent of men employed in agriculture) and educational status (percent of men having only a basic In multifactorial analysis educational status and ethnic structure entered the model.

The most health decline occurred in agricultural southern districts with high percentage of minority and with high percentage of men with the lowest educational status.

Lifestyle probably presents the background of these relations, but there is a lack of reliable data from the individual districts for a more profound analysis.

More sophisticated epidemiological research projects are important for the formulation of a public health strategy In Slovakia.