Do All Men Die Equally?

Men’s health lags far behind women’s health, not only in the public eye, but also as a focus of the medical profession.

Do men die sooner than women? And can a black man die for the same reason as a white man?

In a special feature article, we explore the key health risks in men and dig deeper into the data, breaking it down into relevant segments by age and race.

We also explore why men’s health research should include men from all walks of life.

Most Common Causes of Death

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), heart disease is the leading killer when analyzing data for men across all age groups and races in a large 2017 data set for the United States. About a quarter of all deaths in men are caused by heart disease.

But, to understand the whole picture, it makes more sense to look at the data broken down by age or race, as this changes the landscape considerably.

While heart disease may be the most common cause of death among all men taken together, accidents top the list for those under 45. It is the most common cancer in men between the ages of 45 and 85. Once men reach the age of 85, heart disease is the most common cause of death.

Among men under the age of 45, suicide is the second most common cause of death, while among men aged 45 to 64, it is the sixth most common cause.

Among men over age 65, suicide is not among the 10 most common causes.

Homicide is the third most common cause of death among men under the age of 20. Between the ages of 20 and 44, homicide ranks fourth, while it drops out of the top 10 among men over 45.

When breaking the data down by race, heart disease is again the leading cause for men of all ages, with cancer coming in second, except for Asians or Pacific Islanders where the opposite is true.

Rank	White	Black	American Indian or Alaska Native	Asian or Pacific Islander	Hispanic	All races and origins
1	Heart disease 24.7%	Heart disease 23.7%	Heart disease 19.4%	Cancer 24.8%	Heart disease 20.3%	Heart disease 24.2%
2	Cancer 22.4%	Cancer 20.2%	Cancer 16.4%	Heart disease 22.6%	Cancer 19.4%	Cancer 21.9%
3	Accidents 7.2%	Accidents 7.9%	Accidents 13.8%	Stroke 6.6%	Accidents 11.5%	Accidents 7.6%
4	Chronic lower respiratory diseases 5.9%	Homicide 5.0%	Diabetes 5.9%	Accidents 5.6%	Stroke 4.7%	Chronic lower respiratory diseases 5.2%
5	Stroke 4.1%	Stroke 4.9%	Chronic liver disease 5.3%	Diabetes 4.3%	Diabetes 4.7%	Stroke 4.3%
6	Alzheimer’s disease 2.9%	Diabetes 4.3%	Suicide 4.3%	Chronic lower respiratory diseases 3.2%	Chronic liver disease 4.0%	Diabetes 3.2%
7	Diabetes 2.8%	Chronic lower respiratory diseases 3.2%	Chronic lower respiratory diseases 4.2%	Influenza and pneumonia 3.1%	Suicide 2.9%	Alzheimer’s disease 2.6%
8	Suicide 2.7%	Kidney disease 2.6%	Stroke 3.1%	Suicide 2.7%	Chronic lower respiratory diseases 2.5%	Suicide 2.6%
9	Influenza and pneumonia 1.9%	Septicemia 1.7%	Homicide 1.9%	Alzheimer’s disease 2.1%	Homicide 2.4%	Influenza and pneumonia 1.8%
10	Chronic liver disease 1.7%	Hyper-tension 1.6%	Influenza and pneumonia 1.8%	Kidney disease 2.1%	Alzheimer’s disease 2.1%	Chronic liver disease 1.8%

The third most common cause of death is accidents among all men, except in Asians or Pacific Islanders, where it is stroke.

In the fourth position, the causes of death become significantly more diverse. For all men, as well as for white men as a subgroup, these are chronic lower respiratory diseases. For black men it is homicide, while for American Indian or Alaska Native men it is diabetes, for Asian or Pacific Islander men it is accidents, and for Hispanic men it is stroke.

Suicidality traits ranked eighth for Asian or Pacific Islander and white men, sixth for American Indian or Alaska Native men, and seventh for Hispanic men. It is not among the 10 most common causes of death for black men.

Putting Men’s Health in the Spotlight

A 2019 study shows that men’s health is underrepresented in biomedical research. When comparing published studies, the term “women’s health” was about 10 times more common than the term “men’s health” from 1970 to 2018.

“Perceptions of ‘patriarchy’ and ‘male privilege’ abound in the media and academic journals. According to the study’s author, these concepts, and the ethics surrounding them, are not only misguided, but harmful to men’s health. Harmful. “They distract from men’s health issues, and in general, they don’t accurately reflect the lives of many men.”

An international group of experts released a perspective article in the Bulletin of the World Health Organization in 2014, calling for men to be “included in the global health equity agenda.” They suggest that efforts to improve global public health should focus on both women’s and men’s health.