MARRIAGE BENEFITS HEALTH: FOR MEN STAYING SINGLE ‘WORSE THAN SMOKING’

WARWICK, England, August 15, 2002 (LSN.ca) - The health benefits of marriage are so large that single men suffer worse health effects than smokers, according to a new study.  Professor Andrew Oswald of Warwick University north of Oxford, studied thousands of records from the British Household Panel Survey and the British Retirement Survey. He found that, even when the effects of smoking, drinking and other unhealthy activities were factored in, married men had a much lower risk of death. Over a seven year period, the married male had a 9% lower risk, and the married female 2.9% lower, compared with the unmarried. But a male smoker had a 5.8% greater risk, and a female smoker, 5.1%.  The reasons for the positive marriage effect are hard to quantify, Oswald says. But the most likely factor is the “social support” of having a wife or husband nearby. Another explanation is that both single men and women tend to have a less healthy lifestyle including sleep, diet and work habits, and to be more prone to loneliness and depression.  To read the BBC News report see:  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/2195609.stm