PROTECTIVE LAYER OF FAT

WE MAY not appreciate it, but women’s higher body fat content is protective in many ways.

‘At pretty much every age in history, women seem to have survived better,’ says Professor Steven Austad, an international expert on ageing. He says women — who are more ‘robust’ — tend to outlive men by five or six years.

This may be because they have more body fat than men (around 12 per cent of our body mass, compared to just 3 per cent in men), with deep layers designed to keep both us and our babies warm.

When it comes to one-off traumatic events, such as car crashes, size is on our side, too. The average man is taller, bigger and broader than the average woman, meaning he has more cells vulnerable to damage — and his recovery is slower.