Gallup is out with a special series of articles on women around the world. Gallup analysts mined Gallup World Poll data from more than 140 countries to uncover the areas in which women trail behind men the most.
Health turned out to be one area in particular where women lag men worldwide. Specifically, women are less likely than men to be satisfied with their health and are more likely to experience physical pain, health problems, and sadness.
The gender gaps on these metrics vary across the world, with some regions and countries faring much worse than others. Here are a few key takeaways from the analysis:
- Overall, womens' health lags mens' the most in the former Soviet Union. Take a look at how woman and men there compare
- In addition to the former Soviet Union, women in Pakistan are also falling behind men in terms of their self-reported health. Women there are 20 percentage points less likely than men to be satisfied with their health -- tied with Belarus for the largest gender gap in the world. Pakistani women are also significantly more likely than Pakistani men to report experiencing physical pain -- 56% vs. 37%, respectively.
- Women and men tend to report about the same health status in sub-Saharan Africa and in the Middle East and North Africa. However, this is because women and men are doing equally poorly in many of the countries in those regions.
- Still, despite the gender gaps in health around the world, women are just as likely as men to rate their lives highly enough to be "thriving."
Read the full analysis here and follow the entire series here.