A new global study found that boys are more likely to be born premature than girls. And even if they are born full term, they are more vulnerable to complications and deaths.
A group of 50 researchers led by by neonatologist Joy Lawn of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine found that boys happened to be more at risk than girls because the latter develop faster in the womb.
They found that 14 percent of boys are at risk of being born premature. This is after analyzing records of births worldwide since 2010 in which they found that 15 million out of 135 million total births per year are preterm.
"Throughout development, girls are a little bit ahead of boys. Girls walk before boys, they talk before boys and it's also true in utero," wrote Dr. Lawn.
"Boys face a triple whammy," she added. "They are more likely to be born preterm, and if they are, they have a greater risk of death, disability or blindness. And even when they are full term, they have a higher risk of birth complications such as jaundice and infection."
In an attempt to explain the vulnerability of boys, researchers were able to gather different theories. One is a Scandinavian study showing that women often experience problems in their placenta when carrying boys which affects the nourishment given to the fetus while inside the womb. Another is the incompatibility of the male hormones to their mothers which affects the lung development if the babies.
Aside from this boys versus girls birth discovery, the researchers found that about one million babies die due to prematurity but 75 percent of those deaths could have been avoided if proper medical attention was given. Most of the casualties are from low-income countries such as sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.
On premature birth complications, common are blindness, cerebral palsy and brain damage.
The study funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation was published in the Nov. 15 issue of the online journal Pediatric Research .
