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In Canada, the top three causes of death for men are cancer (31.1%), heart disease (21.6%) and unintentional injuries (5.0%). The top two are the same for women, although with slightly different percentages: cancer and heart disease account for 28.5% and 19.7% of all deaths among women, with stroke (7.0%) coming in third. In the US, men die at an overall rate 1.4-times higher than women, of heart disease 1.6-times more, and are twice as likely to die from an unintentional injury.
In fact, women outlive men by 4.5 years on average worldwide – 66.5 years vs 71.0 years. This difference increase to 7 years in the developed world. Not only are men more likely to die from the causes above, men are also more likely to commit suicide than women. This gender difference increased following the recession. A time trend analysis from the UK found that approximately 850 more men, and 155 more women committed suicide than would have been expected based on historical trends following the 2008 economic downturn, with the highest increases in those regions that were most affected by rising unemployment.
But what leads to these outcomes? Given we live in a world where people can get help when they need it, why should men be dying at a rate that is that much higher than women for (almost) the same diseases? And why are they dying younger than women?
Mr Epidemiology 