Ten things you never knew about... redheads

Today is International Kiss A Ginger Day, founded in 2009 to celebrated redheadedness. It is also National Marzipan Day in the US but I don’t like marzipan, so here are some facts about redheads.

1. Kiss A Ginger Day was originally inspired as a protest about a South Park episode first shown in 2005 in which the theme was Kick A Ginger Day. 2. Worldwide, only around two per cent of people have natural red or ginger hair. 3. Scotland (13 per cent) and Ireland (10 per cent) have the highest rate of redheads. 4. A full head of ginger hair contains around 90,000 hairs. Blondes have more than 100,000.

5. It has often been claimed that bees are more likely to sting redheads. This seems to be an urban myth. Bees cannot even see the colour red.

6. Redheads are more sensitive to pain; the gene that causes ginger hair is linked to pain receptors.

7. Redheads also need more anaesthetic than blondes or brunettes before operations.

8. In 1893, two Italian scientists claimed that 48 per cent of women criminals had red hair. 9. Forget shades of grey, you can get at least 50 shades of red hair dye. 10. “While the rest of the human race are descended from monkeys, redheads derive from cats.” (Mark Twain).