For years, science has tried to work out why women seem to regularly live longer than men. And while you can often find some fine evidence given some of the downright ridiculous things that men do for attention/to seem macho, there is a genuine scientific trend to this. And science has found that it’s not just our own species that has this problem – it seems to be a more global trend than we first assumed.
Research teams have been looking at various demographics of animals and creatures such as bats, lions, orcas, and even gorillas. They have found that for the most part, female mammals tend to outlive their male counterparts in just about every time. sometimes, it was a massive gap as well. The average was around 18.6%; a huge example of just how much longer females are living than males. At close to one-fifth longer on average, it’s clearly something that men love to do that is killing them off faster than their female companions!
With over 100 species studied and over 130 populations in total, this study was about as wide-reaching and as wide-ranging as it comes. That’s why you might want to look a bit closer at the data; this isn’t anecdotal at all. The research team at the Biometry and Evolutionary Biology Laboratory at the University of Lyon, headed p by Jean-Francois Lemaitre, who is a researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research, carried out the largest study of mammal demographics known so far.
The findings were staggering. While male women are lasting on average 7.8% more than the average men, in animals the figures were even more pronounced. It found that nine out of ten people over the age of 110 were female, too, showing us that men living long lives really isn’t as common as many would have assumed.
However, they found that the starkest cases came from orcas and gorillas, where some 60% of females lived longer than the males. This just goes to show us that this isn’t just some oft-repeated scientific statement – it’s backed up by the numbers. And while some people might not be too happy to admit this, it’s a part of scientific fact today – women seem to last a fair bit longer than men, regardless of the species that is being reviewed.