Life insurance sales in the United States increased by 5.7% last month.

According to the Medical Information Bureau (MIB) Life Index, which measures application activity for individually underwritten life insurance in the US, the demand for life insurance rose 5.7% across all age groups in January, year over year. Results have been improving since the last quarter of 2014, with year over year increases of 5.2% and 2.6% in November and December respectively.

"January’s strength was that much more impressive considering it had one fewer business day than the January 2014 comparative period," notes the MIB. "January application activity was up 1.5% from that of December, the first monthly increase for this time period since 2012."

Application activity increased across all age groups in January with ages 0 to 44 up by 5.7%, ages 45 to 59 gaining 5.3%, and ages 60 and above increasing by 6.3% year-over-year. "As of January 2015, all signs point to a rising trend of application activity for the industry," concludes the MIB.