Reasons Women Live Longer Than Men

Reasons why women live longer then men It is an accepted fact of life that men enjoy certain physical advantages over women. Men are stronger, taller, faster and less likely to be overweight, but they have then tendency to die before their female counterparts. Their date rate is higher than women in many different societies. Women, as a group, live longer than men. In all developed countries and most undeveloped ones, women outlive men, sometimes by a margin of as much as 10 years. In the U. S.   life expectancy  at birth is about 79 years for women and about 72 years for men. The gender discrepancy is most pronounced in the very old: among centenarians  worldwide, women outnumber men nine to one. The gender gap has widened in this century as gains in female life expectancy have exceeded those for males. The death rates for women are lower than those for men at all ages–even before birth. Although boys start life with some numerical leverage about 115 males are conceived for every 100 females. Their numbers are preferentially whittled down thereafter. Just 104 boys are born for every 100 girls because of the  disproportionate rate of spontaneous abortions, stillbirths and miscarriages of male fetuses. More boys than girls die in infancy. And during each subsequent year of life, mortality rates for males exceed those for females, so that by age 25 women are in the majority. The reason women live longer than men can be explained from a biological, psychological and social view point. There are physiological, psychological and social factors that can account for longevity of women. The reason women live longer than men is because they have better cardiovascular endurance, they have two x chromosomes which further delays aging, men are more engaged in risky behaviors that can cause death, and another reason is that men are more likely to die from depression women. Women have an advantage over men in terns of cardiovascular endurance; disease such a heart attack and stroke are less likely to affect women than men. Woman develop these diseases later in life at about their 70s and 80s while on the other hand male normally get these types of disease about ten years younger in their 50s and 60s. A woman’s heart can become more active than men. A major contributor to biological age  is one’s heart activity; when the heart is more active and  healthier a person’s biological age can be reduced  because of how the heart is still working in a proper way. A woman’s heart tends to be more active primarily because of how the menstruation process causes the heart to exercise and to work at a greater level. One proposed reason for this is the menstruation process which causes a woman’s heart to become active by the release estradiol hormone in the woman’s body during the process. Estradiol will work to give the woman’s heart a greater amount of energy because this is an especially powerful form of estrogen that can cause her heart to be more active. It is more powerful than other types of estrogen that can be found in a woman’s body. Because of the workout that is given to the heart during the menstruation period the heart will be able to work at a better rate and as a result to help with getting one’s biological age reduced. Another reason for the delay in cardiovascular disease in women is that women are relatively iron deficient in comparison to men. This is due to the loss of blood during menstruation; it is especially active in young females. Iron play a very active role in reaction within our cells that produce damaging free radicals which attach unto the cell membrane and DNA, and may translate into aging the cell. A second possible reason for why women live longer than men is the difference in genetic make up. The existence of a second X chromosome in women while men have an X and a Y chromosome is a proposed reason for the longevity of women. When there is damage caused to the cell variations, women have back-up chromosome variations that men do not have. The assumption is that since men only have one X chromosome, they have a greater chance of aging more rapidly. Chromosomal differences between men and women may also affect their mortality rates due to diseases. Chromosomes carry genetic mutations that cause a number of life-threatening diseases, including muscular dystrophy and hemophilia. Because women have two X chromosomes, a female with an abnormal gene on one of her X chromosomes can use the normal gene on the other and thereby avoid the expression of disease even though she is still a carrier of the defect. Men, in contrast, have one X chromosome and one Y chromosome, and so they cannot rely on an alternative chromosome if a gene on one of the sex chromosomes is defective. If a man has a defect in this gene, his body's ability to repair the mutations that arise during cell division could be severely compromised. The accumulation of such mutations is thought to contribute to aging and disease. The second X chromosome as a longevity factor in and of itself. Although one of the two Xs is randomly inactivated early in life, the second X seems to become more active with increasing age. It may be that genes on the second X activates and compensate for genes on the first X that have been lost or damaged with age. A third reason for the mortality rate be higher for males is the fact that men are more likely to engage in risky life-threatening behavior thus raising the mortality rate among them. While this is a more social reasoning it can be explained using biological terms. The male specie experience what is known as â€Å"testosterone storm† in their late teens and 20s. At this stage the level of this hormone is in high quantity and it induce some dangerous behavior and bring out an aggressive nature in men. Some male dominated sports such as drag racing, motorcycling, sky diving, mountain climbing and even boxing are dangerous sports that have caused death of the participants. They may also engage in reckless behavior such as smoking, abusing alcohol, poor dieting and driving without a seat belt. These reckless behavior can cause death in the long run by death or immediately by accidents. The homicide rate of men is much higher than that of females. Men are more involved in violent and illegal activities that most of the time result is death due to violence. Such activities include scamming, drug dealing, gang involvement, gun trafficking, among others. In Jamaica murder is one of the leading cause of death for men in early adulthood, and some of the time these victims are perpetrators of this same crime. As the saying goes â€Å"live by the gun, die by the gun†. A forth and final reason is that men are more likely to die from depression that females. Depressing is higher among male that females. While many females will go to seek help for their depression, male are more reluctant to actively seek help from a counselor or even a friend. They would prefer to keep it inside and they may hold the motion that as long as it is not visible then its fine. Many men are harboring emotional distress and torment that cause depression. Depression and grief and affect one's health and further cause death. Depression can lead to suicide; men are more likely to die from attempted suicide than females. This is because male tend to use more fatal methods to carry out the action, for example, a woman would probably try to kill herself by overdosing on pills or medication while a man would jump off a ten story building. Overdose of pills can be remedied if detected early enough but if when a person jumps off a building there is no turning back or pause, they are heading at full speed ahead to the ground causing immediate death. In conclusion, the mortality rate for men is higher at all ages than female; it is almost as if women have a natural adaptation for survival. There are biological, psychological and social reasoning for this phenomenon which are hormonal difference, difference in genetic make up, psychological healthiness and the social on look on risk taking and dangerous activities.