At the same time, addiction to injected drugs is doubling every ten years, but almost only amongst men. If you compare all the major killers, such as heart disease and lung cancer, men easily come out best, from the undertakers point of view. Heart disease is the number one killer for men. Worse still, one in six will die from heart disease before the age of 75 years. Testosterone may make us more susceptible, while oestrogen, may protect women from heart disease, but this is not the whole story.
Lung cancer is the biggest cancer killer amongst men, a disease directly related to smoking.
Cancer of the prostate will see off over 9,500 men each year, four times as many men than cervical cancer will kill women. Of the 200 deaths from testicular cancer from the 1200 cases reported each year, almost none need ever have died. Even once relatively obscure conditions, such as melanoma, kill more men than women despite their being more cases of the cancer in women. There are many obvious indicators of men s needs. These views, combined with the clear need for action, indicate that there is both a need for planned interventions and a desire among men to be responsive to initiatives.