COVID-19 Global Men's Health update
Our friends at Global Action for Men's Health (GAMH) have provided an international update on some of the links between coronavirus (COVID-19) and gender in their latest news bulletin.
Last month, GAMH reported evidence from China suggesting that mortality rates from COVID-19 in men were almost twice as high as in women. The proportion of male deaths from the virus in Italy has been even higher: of the 827 deaths recorded by 11 March, 80% were male.
This pattern, if confirmed over a longer time period, would be consistent with what epidemiologists observed during the SARS and MERS outbreaks. In the 2003 SARS outbreak in Hong Kong, for instance, nearly 22% of infected men died, compared to around 13% of women. In an analysis of MERS infections between 2017 and 2018, around 32% of men died, and nearly 26% of women.
The mortality 'gap' could be caused by sex-based immunological or gendered differences, such as patterns and prevalence of smoking. The sex disparity also holds true in SARS-infected mice and it may be that the hormone oestrogen has a protective effect: removing the ovaries of infected female mice or blocking the oestrogen receptor makes the animals more likely to die compared to infected control mice.
The recently-established Gender and COVID-19 Working Group has observed that 'Policies and public health efforts have not addressed the gendered impacts of disease outbreaks. The response to COVID-19 appears no different. We are not aware of any gender analysis of the outbreak by global health institutions or governments in affected countries or in preparedness phases. Recognising the extent to which disease outbreaks affect women and men differently is a fundamental step to understanding the primary and secondary effects of a health emergency on different individuals and communities, and for creating effective, equitable policies and interventions.'
Meanwhile, the Men's Health Forum (Great Britain) has called for a gender-sensitive approach to COVID-19 and also published a 'Toolbox Talk' on the virus. This is mainly aimed at men in the workplace but can be used as a health education tool with any group of men.
GAMH would welcome any information about male-targeted work on COVID-19 in other countries. You can email any information to us at [email protected] and we'll pass it on.
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Read: Men's health initiatives scale back in the face of coronavirus (AMHF)