The disparity is widest among people aged 15 to 64, years when many are working, raising children and supporting ageing parents. Far more men in Tamil Nadu are dying as compared to women.
A public health department analysis of civil registration system (CRS) data from 2018 to 2022, published in the medical journal by the directorate of public health, found male mortality higher than female mortality from age 15 onward in every district. At least 50 people, mostly men, die every day of road crashes in Tamil Nadu. many men go without screening till 40 While most women are screened at least during their pregnancy and after delivery.
Because of lost wages, evening clinics have been introduced to improve access for working people who may avoid daytime visits.
Public health expert Dr T Sundararaman, former executive director of the National Health Systems Resource Centre, says these figures are more than just about demography. We should be investing in saving these young lives,” he said. The age pattern is consistent with several overlapping risks, experts said: road crashes and suicide among younger men; and cardiovascular disease, stroke, diabetes, kidney failure, chronic respiratory illness and tobacco and alcohol-related disease in the middle aged. “We see an epidemic of strokes, heart attacks and renal failure in much younger people — much more in men than in women,” said Dr T S Selvavinayagam, a former director of public health who has published research on mortality in Tamil Nadu. “If these illnesses are detected in time and people are put on chronic care treatment, their life expectancy normalises,” he said. “Men don’t visit PHCs fearing loss of daily wages,” said director of public health Dr A Somasundaram. “The evening clinics help us diagnose, treat and manage blood sugar and pressure in men.”
The pattern has persisted, experts say. The CRS is India’s legally mandated system for continuously recording births, deaths and stillbirths. “Families are losing fathers too early. Women are getting widowed. An equal number die of suicides. Tamil Nadu is not starting from zero. Its health programmes include doorstep screening for chronic diseases, early diagnosis and treatment for cardiac conditions, emergency care for road-crash victims and health checks for construction workers. But these schemes are not yet framed as a unified strategy to reduce premature male deaths or evaluated against a target for keeping men alive through their working years.