Men are more susceptible to coronavirus than women
Imbalance may be from women having a stronger immune system
The coronavirus is far more deadly for men than women, with males 65% more likely to die from an infection than females, new analysis shows.
The latest breakdown of figures from the World Health Organisation (WHO) and Chinese scientists shows that of all suspected cases 1.7% of women who contract the virus will die, compared with 2.8% of men. In confirmed cases, the infection is fatal for 4.7% of men but just 2.8% of women, even though the gender balance for those testing positive is roughly split in half.
Some experts believe the sex imbalance relates to a higher prevalence of smoking or chronic alcohol use among men, while others think that men are more likely to have underlying health conditions, such as heart disease and diabetes, which make them more vulnerable to an infection.
During the height of the Wuhan epidemic, 16% of people receiving dialysis at Renmin Hospital contracted the disease, and 16% died.
Though the overall global death rate is still being calculated, with estimates ranging from 1% to 3.8%, the analysis by Worldometer shows it jumps hugely when people have health problems.
For example, the risk of death jumps to 10.5% for people with cardiovascular disease, 7.3% for diabetics, 6.3% for those with chronic respiratory disease, 6% for people with high blood pressure and 5.6% for cancer sufferers.
However, Paul Hunter, professor of medicine at the University of East Anglia, believes women may simply have better immune systems and are biologically better at fighting off the virus.
“Some of the differences are probably due to men smoking more and being chronic abusers of alcohol, but, also, women are intrinsically different to men in their immune response,” he said.
“Sometimes that works in women’s favour. Women seem to have more powerful immune systems, which means they suffer more from autoimmune disease, like rheumatoid arthritis, when the immune system responds overaggressively and ends up attacking the body.
“This happens in men far less frequently, but it appears to be a good thing for a number of infections and particularly influenza and there is evidence women produce better antibody responses to the influenza vaccine than men.”
Older men may be particularly at risk because the death rate rockets in the elderly. While the chance of dying from the virus for anyone under 50 is less than 0.5%, it jumps to 1.3% after 50, then nearly trebles to 3.6% after 60.
By the time someone reaches 70, their risk of dying has hit 8% and then rises to 14.8% for the over 80s, who are far and away the most vulnerable group.
On Thursday evening, NHS Berkshire confirmed the first person to die in Britain was an “older patient with underlying health conditions”.
The British man who died after contracting the virus on the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which was quarantined off the Japanese coast, was in his 70s.
Though many older people are often suffering from chronic disease, which makes them more vulnerable, the immune system itself begins to break down in later life. Diseases that are largely harmless in youth, such as chickenpox, hide in the body and can become deadly shingles as people get older and their immunity begins to decline.
The quality of antibodies produced also diminishes with age, preventing the body from clearing out viruses quickly and efficiently.
“Our immune systems start giving up the ghost,” said Hunter. “You’re going to delay coming up with an antibody.”
Young children seem to be protected against coronavirus. So far there have been no deaths among those under 10 years, and the disease is fatal for just 0.2% of people between 10 and 40.
Dr Andrew Freeman, a reader in infectious diseases at
Cardiff University, said: “I think with children it is likely that they are susceptible to infection, but more likely get mild/ asymptomatic infection.
“This does occur with some other viral infections such as Epstein-Barr virus infection, which causes glandular fever in young adults, and also hepatitis A. We still have a lot to learn about this virus.”
SOME OF THE DIFFERENCES ARE PROBABLY DUE TO MEN SMOKING MORE AND BEING CHRONIC ABUSERS OF ALCOHOL