Posted Feb 1, 2011
Glasgow (dpa) – Smoking is the main reason that men die earlier than women in Europe, according to a study by Scottish scientists published in the journal Tobacco Control.
Researchers from the MRC/CSO Social and Public Health Sciences Unit in Glasgow evaluated World Health Organization (WHO) data on 30 European countries around the year 2005.
The data showed that smoking killed more than twice as many men in these countries – all of which have longer-living women on average – as alcohol consumption did. And smoking accounted for 40-60 per cent of the gender gap in mortality, the researchers said.
The higher life expectancy of women throughout Europe has been the subject of many health debates. Among the possible reasons cited is that women see a doctor more frequently or simply have a stronger constitution.
Causes of death linked to smoking included cancer of the respiratory organs as well as certain heart, vascular and lung diseases. Alcohol-linked causes of death included liver diseases and oesophageal cancer.
The size of the gender gap in life expectancy varied greatly. It was smallest in Iceland and largest in Ukraine. Germany occupied a middle position; half of the difference in mortality there was due to smoking and about a fifth to drinking.
Alcohol-related deaths were responsible for a much greater share of the gender gap in Eastern Europe – 20-30 per cent – than in Western Europe, where the figure ranged from 10 to 20 per cent. In Malta, smoking was a particularly big reason for men dying earlier than women: 74 per cent.
The researchers concluded that changes in smoking habits would likely lessen the gender gap in mortality in the coming decades.
They also pointed out possible inaccuracies in the study due to fatal illnesses caused by both smoking and drinking, as well as to differences in interpreting the data in the various countries involved. No age-specific data were collected.