Men are well known for their tendency to over-emphasise their suffering of the common cold. Referred to as ‘man flu’, women have long argued the fact that the seemingly extreme symptoms suffered by men are, in fact a figment of their other-half’s imagination, and it seems the scientific community agrees.
Data collected by flutracking.net, Australia’s online influenza-like illness surveillance system, raises questions about the ‘man flu’ myth.
Dr Amanda Ellison, of Britain’s Durham University, reached the conclusion that men really do suffer more with coughs and colds as they have more temperature receptors in the brain.
“When you have a cold one of the things that happens is you get an increase in temperature to fight off the bugs,” explains Dr Ellison. “The bugs can’t survive at higher temperatures. When your immune system is under attack the preoptic nucleus increases temperature to kill off the bugs. But men have more temperature receptors because that area of the brain is bigger in men than women. So men run a higher temperature and feel rougher – and if they complain they feel rough then maybe they’re right.”
However, an analysis of more than 16,000 flutracking.net participants casts doubt on the reality of Dr Ellison’s conclusion, finding little difference between the average duration of illness of men and women responding to the weekly surveillance surveys.
According to the analysis, women took an average of three days off their normal duties with a cough and fever, whereas men took an average of 2.8 days off. Among those ill enough to visit an emergency department, women took an average of four days off, whereas men took 3.5 days off.
Of course, the duration of time taken off from normal activities is only suggestive of the severity of the illness. Men may have taken the same amount of time off as women but with less severe illness, or it may be that they really are tougher than women give them credit for. The decreased duration of illness among males with cough and fever visiting an emergency department could represent stoicism or perhaps that they were more likely to present to an emergency department with milder illness.
Where males and females do differ is in the timing of their illness throughout the influenza season. Females were more likely to pick up colds and flu earlier in the season than males and then again just after the peak of influenza activity in mid-July. This may be explained by females providing more care for their poorly family members.
Dr Craig Dalton, director of the flutracking.net system, said there were many reasons why two people with the same viral infection might experience differences in the severity of disease including past immunity, genetics, and the dose of virus exposure.
Flutracking.net is a joint project of the University of Newcastle and Hunter New England Local Health District and is funded by the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing. To join this crowd sourced influenza surveillance system go to Flutracking.net.
