Cancer death risk is 70% higher in men

Mail Online

Unhealthy lifestyles and a 'stiff upper lip' make men up to 70 per cent more likely to die from cancer than women, doctors have warned.

Their reluctance to visit a GP was given as a major reason for the higher risk after an analysis of cancer records.

Overall, men are 16 per cent more likely to develop cancer than women and 40 per cent more likely to die from it.

But when breast, prostate and other forms of the disease that affect one sex more than the other are taken out of the equation, the gap becomes even wider.

Men are then 62 per cent more likely to be diagnosed with cancer and 69 per cent more likely to die from it, the journal European Urology Supplements reports.

For some cancers, the figures are even more alarming.

British men are almost three times as likely to be killed by bladder cancer and twice as likely to die from kidney cancer as women, even though there is no biological reason for this.

Researcher Professor David Forman, from the University of Leeds, said men have a reputation for having a 'stiff upper lip', meaning they are reluctant to visit the doctor.

They also tend to be less health conscious than women, he said, and miss out on the routine health checks women are given when prescribed contraception and during pregnancy.

Another researcher, Catherine Thomson, of Cancer Research UK, said: 'We feel there aren't any obvious biological reasons, so we think it is about lifestyle risk factors, in terms of men being less likely to go to their GP and more likely to ignore the symptoms and bury their heads in the sand.'

Smoking is more common in men, and they are bigger drinkers.

Alcohol fuels cancer by increasing blood supply to tumours and by damaging DNA - a problem exacerbated by smoking. Poor diet is also a problem, with men eating more red meat and less fruit and vegetables than women.

Men tend to accumulate fat around their stomach, rather than waist and thighs, which raises the risks of many health problems including cancer.

Professor Alan White, one of the study's authors and an expert in men's health from Leeds Metropolitan University, said regular health checks at work could catch men who wouldn't normally visit their GP.