Explainer: Do men fare worse with COVID-19?

[snoop1130]

Explainer: Do men fare worse with COVID-19?

By Kate Kelland

 

FILE PHOTO: A man wearing a protective face mask rides a bicycle on a street, following an outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Beijing, China April 7, 2020. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins

 

LONDON (Reuters) - Death and infection tolls from the COVID-19 pandemic spreading around the world point to men being more likely than women to contract the disease and to suffer severe or critical complications if they do.

 

Here are some insights from research and experts:

 

ARE MEN MORE SUSCEPTIBLE TO INFECTION WITH THE NEW CORONAVIRUS?

 

It looks that way, yes.

 

In Italy, an analysis of more than 127,700 COVID-19 cases found that 52.9% of all infected people were men and 47.1% women. Among Italy’s first 14,860 deaths, almost 68% were men.

 

A Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention report found that in a dataset of 44,672 confirmed cases, there was a 1.1% higher COVID-19 fatality rate in men compared to women.

 

“Evidence is mounting that men are experiencing more severe symptoms and have a higher mortality rate when compared to women,” said James Gill, a specialist at Warwick Medical School.

 

DO WE KNOW WHY?

 

There are still many outstanding questions around why men are more frequently and harder hit by COVID-19 infection, but health specialists point to a number of possible factors.

 

These include both behavioural and biological risks:

 

* Unhealthy habits, smoking, and their impact

 

Experts say one influence may be that men, in general, don’t look after their bodies as well as women do - with lower levels of handwashing and hygiene, and higher levels of smoking, alcohol use, obesity and other unhealthy behaviours.

 

In many countries, smoking rates are higher among men than women, and smoking is a known risk factor for many other life-threatening conditions such as heart disease, high blood pressure, lung disease and cancer.

 

The sex differential in smoking is particularly marked in China, where 50% of men smoke, compared to 5% of women. In Italy, a 2018 analysis found smoking was more common among men than women across all adult age groups.

 

* Women’s “aggressive” immune response

 

Another factor is the relative strength of the male and female immune responses.

 

Research shows that immune response throughout life - to everything from vaccines and infections to autoimmune diseases - is typically more aggressive in women than in men. With COVID-19, a respiratory disease caused by a coronavirus, this may be a particularly significant factor.

 

Philip Goulder, a professor of immunology at Oxford University, says several factors contribute to women having more aggressive immune systems, including that females have two X chromosomes compared to one in males, and that a number of critical immune genes are found on the X chromosome.

 

“In particular, the protein by which viruses such as coronavirus are sensed is encoded on the X chromosome,” Goulder said. That means this protein is expressed at twice the dose on many immune cells in women compared to men, which in turn could well be boosting females’ ability to ward off COVID-19.

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-04-08

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[atyclb]

no mention whether they adjusted age. 

[UbonThani]

Nagging reduces immune function plus child birth increases it.

[mfd101]

Nothing new in any of this. Everywhere in the world - in rich & poor countries - women have a higher life expectancy than men (usually 2 to 5 or even 6 years).

 

And even if you look at life expectancy at, say, 30 (to eliminate the high level of young male Darwin awards), you still have women out in front.

[Sheryl]

It is not at all clear that men get COVID infection more often than women, in no place is there sufficient testing, statistically representative of the population as whole, to determine this. We will find out later when there have been representative studies of antibody levels.

 

What is clear is that men when infected are more likely than women to develop  severe case. (Most men still have mild case, of course - but among those with sever case, a disproportionate percent are male).

 

Too soon to say why and makes no difference to measures people need to take. While women have proportionately fewer severe cases, there are still severe cases and deaths in women so hardly a reason not to worry. An while men are more prone to severe cases, most men will have  mild case so hardly a reason to assume the worst is inevitable should you get it.

 

There is a great deal yet to be learned about the pathogenesis of this disease in humans, it has been being studied less than 5 months.

[justin case]

thai air is as healthy as smoking a pack of siggies per day, babies, children, adults, no difference

 

men don't bleed monthly, so IRON is higher in men

 

high iron = INFLAMMATION, late onset T2D, CANCER...

 

Edited April 9, 2020 by justin case

[TooBigToFit]

Something on this topic.

 

The largest study yet of children with COVID-19 suggests that males and infants may face a higher risk of infection and severe illness - BusinessInsider

 

https://www.businessinsider.com/cdc-children-coronavirus-infants-boys-may-face-higher-risk-2020-4

 

One of the stats from BI in the article "Of the children with COVID-19, 57% were male, suggesting that "biological factors" could make men more susceptible to the virus. " 

 

 

I wonder what the male/female ratio is in Thailand based on age. I remember seeing some research decades ago that said that Thailand had something off here as there were an abnormal amount of females births to male births. Combine that with attrition from accidents and the rest of it as the population ages, the male to female stats might even be more widened than found in a lot of countries. It may well be that some of the higher death rates seen around the world are simply due to the victims being available. Don't go overboard on my comment. It's just a nobody pondering things. My idea might be connected to the Freakonomics idea related to the economists idea on abortion and crime if anyone read that. Now I wonder how China's one-child policy relates where male babies were preferred in the past. How old would they be now? Okay, enough.

[wwest5829]

If you are a "mature" male (or female really), you already know that from the time the X and Y sperm were fighting to fertilize the egg, that the female is the stronger of the human species.