Having a son shortens a woman’s life span. Scientific American:

Sons are tough on their mothers…Virpi Lummaa of the University of Sheffield in England can prove it: sons reduce a mother’s life span by an average of 34 weeks. The 33-year-old Finnish evolutionary biologist, aided by genealogists, has scoured centuries-old tomes…for birth, marriage and death records — and clues about the influence of evolution on human reproduction…

she found that those who bore sons had shorter life spans than those who gave birth to daughters. This discrepancy has to do with birth weight—male babies are typically larger—as well as testosterone. “Testosterone can compromise your immune system; it can affect your health,” Lummaa says, and the mothers of sons proved especially susceptible to endemic infectious disease, such as tuberculosis. “Boys are a little bit more costly” to raise than girls as well, because they drain more physical resources from their mothers, she adds, as has been seen in other mammals, such as the red deer. Sons also are not as likely as daughters to stick around to help their mothers out later in life…

sons are not just tough on their mothers but also hard on their siblings. Those born after a son were physically slighter, had smaller families and generally had a greater chance of dying from an infectious disease.

Whew. Thanks for the information. Now if we can just stop women from having any sons, maybe the human race could live forever.

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