Four out of five Americans who make it to 100 are women, but you guys are slowly catching up and faring better overall.
The 2010 Census found 44,202 of the 53,364 people ages 100 and older are women, according to a report out Monday. The number of centenarians has increased 5.8% since 2000.
What helps the women? The New England Centenarian Study suggests women cope better with stress and develop age-related diseases later than men. However, men who do survive to 100 are functioning better than women. The Census report finds men were most likely to be living with others in a household while women are more likely to be living in a nursing home than any other living arrangement.
"It's good news for men and women," says Toni Miles, director of the Institute of Gerontology at the University of Georgia. "Men are taking better care of themselves. We're finding that some women, in the past, were harmed during deliveries of children, making it harder in later years to walk. But we hope that's not the case now, so women in the future can also remain in a household."
An earlier Census report shows the age group where men are catching up the fastest: The number of men ages 85 to 94 rose 47% from 2000 while the number of women in that age group rose just 23%.
The Census report also finds:
The population 100 and older made up a small proportion of the total U.S. population, representing fewer than two per 10,000 people.
More than half (62.5%) of centenarians were age 100 or 101.
There are just 330 supercentenarians (ages 110 and older).
Centenarians are less diverse than the rest of the population, the authors write. Nearly 83% are white, compared with about 72% in the total population. Nearly 6% (5.8%) are Hispanic (16.3% of total population), and 12.2% are African American (12.6% of total population).
They are in higher concentrations in the Midwest and Northeast.
Other countries are still faring better: The U.S. proportion (1.73 centenarians per 10,000 people) is about half of Japan's (3.43), and behind France (2.70), Sweden (1.92) and the United Kingdom (1.95).
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