TB and injuries from violence lead rural men to die more than 10 years before women
A "remarkable" difference in the respective life expectancy of men and women in a rural area is due to tuberculosis (TB) and injuries linked to violence.On average‚ women in the uMkhanyakude District — bordering Mozambique and Swaziland in the north of KwaZulu-Natal — live 10.4 years longer than men‚ according to a new study.For HIV-negative people, the gap is even greater‚ at 13.1 years‚ and the researchers say both figures are "exceptionally large" compared with the worldwide average gap of five years.Academics from the school of public health at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) and the African Health Research Institute at the University of KwaZulu-Natal‚ with colleagues from the UK and US‚ attributed 5.6 years of the life expectancy gap in HIV-negative people to the higher TB mortality rate among men."Elevated rates of external injuries among men accounted for 4.1 years of the total sex difference‚" they wrote in the journal Plos One.Data used by the scientists came fro...
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