A group of scientists may finally have solved the mystery of why wives outlive their husbands after discovering that women’s hearts age better than men’s. Researchers found that while a man’s heart can lose up to a quarter of its pumping power between 18 and 70, the heart of a healthy 70-year-old woman can perform almost as well as it did when she was 20. On average, British women live five years longer than British men, and women over 60 are now the fastest-growing group in society. A team from John Moores University in Liverpool, led by Professor David Goldspink, spent two years studying ageing in more than 250 healthy men and women between the ages of 18 and 80.
