Issue date: January 2-4, 1998
Stories & stats about how "he" and "she" differ
ONE CHROMOSOME MAKES THE DIFFERENCE
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FOR MORE INFORMATION
About men: Men's Health Consulting, 1-800-Well-Men. Information on men's health reform.Men's Maintenance Manuals, 1-800-955-2002. Free booklet by founders of Men's Health Week and the Association of American Family Physicians.Men's Hotline, 512-472-3237
www.menhotline.org
About women: National Women's Health Network Information Clearinghouse, 202-628-7814. Free information packets on women's health issues including fibroids, contraceptives, estrogen replacement therapies.Office of Research on Women's Health, National Institutes of Health. List of publications on women's health, 301-402-1770.
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Human cells have 46 chromosomes, organized in 23 pairs. It's only the 46th chromosome that determines gender. For their part, mothers always contribute a female X chromosome. But fathers can contribute an X or a male Y. An embryo that gets a father's Y will be a boy; an embryo that gets a father's X will be a female. At conception, all of us are unisex. At first, all fetuses have ducts that can grow into male or female genitalia. Female is the "default" gender; maleness happens when a genetic trigger is switched -- and thus a lifetime of differences.
COMPARED WITH WOMEN, MEN ARE: Less physically active, ages 35-54.Bigger eaters of meat and fat, while eating fewer fruits and vegetables and less fiber.Less likely to wear seat belts and more likely to drive drunk.Less likely to use sunscreen and twice as likely to die of skin cancer.Less knowledgeable about health.Three times as likely to be alcoholics.
WOMEN ACHE MORE Women report having headaches twice as often as men. They report backaches 1.5 times as often.
WHY MEN SNORE -- AND THE CURE Men account for 85 percent of the people who snore or have disturbed nighttime breathing. Half of all men snore and one-quarter of all men snore heavily. Snoring happens when the airway is obstructed. Men are prone to obstructions as they gain weight, the neck grows in size and fat blocks the airways. Some snoring indicates sleep apnea, where breathing actually stops, causing heart damage and preventing deep sleep. Men who snore are at 23 times greater risk of having a heart attack. Sleep apnea is three times more prevalent in men than in women. The apnea cure: Weight loss, minor surgical procedures and a home-use machine that forces air in and stops the snoring.
Racial differences
While gender is a factor in health, experts say the two major predictors of poor health are poverty and lack of education. In the United States, those conditions are disproportionately higher among African Americans and Hispanics. Some health differences: Stroke. Blacks die twice as often from strokes as whites do.Tuberculosis. Blacks and Hispanics get it twice as often as whites.Diabetes. Hispanics get it twice as often as whites.Stomach cancer. Hispanics get it twice as often as whites.Breast cancer: In any single year, it's diagnosed in 112 out of 100,000 white women, 95 out of 100,000 black women and 70 out of 100,000 Hispanic women. At all stages, black women are more likely than white women to be untreated.Prostate cancer: African-American men have the highest incidence in the world, three times higher than for white men.Insurance: In 1996, 33% of Hispanics, 23% of blacks and 13% of whites had no health insurance.
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