Jul 12, 2021 20:00:00

Why do women live longer than men?

According to the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare's

simplified life table , the average life expectancy of women in the first year of Reiwa (2019) was 87.45 years, which is more than 6 years higher than 81.41 years for men. This trend is similar in countries other than Japan, and the science media Live Science summarizes why women have a longer life expectancy than men.

Why do women tend to outlive men? | Live Science
https://www.livescience.com/why-women-outlive-men.html

Comparing the amount of estrogen , commonly called the female hormone, and testosterone , a type of male hormone, between women and men, women secrete more estrogen and less testosterone than men. Estrogen works to protect the body from such as heart disease is recognized and, testosterone as opposed to breast cancer and cervical cancer, prostate cancer, etc., is possible to increase the risk of developing multiple of disease it turned out we are. 'Testosterone is known to cause dangerous behavior and is associated with high aggression,' said Virginia Zarli, a demographic researcher at the University of Southern Denmark. He points out that low testosterone production is related to longevity.

Zaruri argues that the difference in chromosomes between men and women is also related to the length of lifespan. Women inherit the X chromosome from both their mother and father, while men inherit the X chromosome from their mother and the Y chromosome from their father. For this reason, diseases caused by mutations on the X chromosome, such as hemophilia and Duchenne muscular dystrophy, do not occur in women unless both X chromosomes are mutated, but in men 1 Men are more likely to develop these disorders because they develop if one of the X chromosomes is mutated.

A survey of 11,000 Catholic monks and nuns from 1890 to 1995 found that women have a life expectancy of about one year longer than men. became. 'The priests' lifestyles are basically the same, and both men and women avoid dangerous behavior, so the difference over the year may be due to biological reasons,' said Zarli. 'Given that the survey was conducted on adult men and women, the difference in life expectancy for biological reasons is likely to be about two years,' he added.

'On average, the difference in lifespan between men and women is four to five years. If the difference is two years for biological reasons, the rest is due to social factors,' Zarli argues. A study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that men were twice as likely to consume excessive alcohol as women. Studies also show that 35% of men in the world smoke, while only 6% of women smoke. In addition, it has been shown that women undergo 33% more medical examinations than men. Zaruri argues that these social factors influence the lifespan difference between men and women.

However, the difference in lifespan between men and women does not continue to widen. The lifespan difference between men and women in the United States has been on the rise since the 1970s, but it is said that the lifespan difference began to decrease around 2005. 'It's possible that women have more opportunities to smoke,' Zarri said.

According to the (PDF link) data of the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare, the difference in life expectancy between men and women in Japan has been on the rise since 1950, but the difference between men and women in 2005 was 6.96. The difference has turned to a decreasing trend.