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15 Leading Causes of Death | Male to
Female Ratio |
Heart Disease | 1.5* |
Cancer | 1.4 |
Stroke | 1.0 |
Chronic Lower Respiratory Disease | 1.3 |
Accidents | 2.2 |
Diabetes | 1.4 |
Alzheimer’s Disease | .07 |
Influenza and Pneumonia | 1.4 |
Kidney Disease | 1.4 |
Blood Poisoning | 1.2 |
Suicide | 4.0 |
Chronic Liver Disease | 2.1 |
Essential Hypertension and Hypertensive Renal Disease | 1.0 |
Parkinson Disease | 2.2 |
Homicide | 3.9 |
* The male death rate is 1.5 times the female death rate |
While it is not clear why the life span of men is shorter than that of women, it is clear that in the United States men exceed women in 12 of the 15 leading causes of death. The age-adjusted death rates for men nationally in 2006 were more than twice as high as women’s rates in accidents (2.2), chronic liver disease (2.1), and Parkinson’s disease (2.2). The greatest disparities between men and women occurred for suicide and homicide with men's death rates four times that of women's rates for suicide (4.0) and homicide (3.9). In only one of the 15 leading causes of death in 2006 did women's death rates exceed men's rates and that was in Alzheimer's disease (see above).
Decades of research have yielded many important clues about health and disease in men. This new knowledge, however, has not necessarily benefited men. For example, men are still less likely than women to seek medical care and are nearly half as likely as women to pursue preventive health visits or undergo screening tests. Despite public health messages about the importance of a healthy diet and regular exercise, the prevalence of overweight and obesity in men continues to increase.
Beliefs about masculinity and manhood can lead men either to take actions that harm themselves or to refrain from engaging in health-protective behaviors. The male tendency to suppress the expression of need and minimize pain is reflected in lower engagement of men in preventive health care visits and the lower levels of adherence to medical regimens than women.
Men also are overrepresented in a broad range of stigmatizing social conditions including: 1) incarceration; 2) homelessness; 3) unemployment; and 4) institutionalization for substance use and severe mental illness. The majority of jail inmates and state and federal prisoners are men. Men tend to work in more dangerous jobs than women, and men represent the majority of job-related fatalities. Among men, those who belong to racial and ethnic minority populations are particularly at risk.
Population estimate (2008)
Health risk factors by gender in Illinois (2007)
Health care utilization by gender in Illinois (2007)
Mortality rates by gender in Illinois (2006)