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Women are faring better than men in the coronavirus pandemic because of their genetic superiority, according to the physician Sharon Moalem. He tells Kirsty Wark that women live longer than men and have stronger immune systems because they have two x chromosomes to choose from. In his book, The Better Half, Moalem calls for better understanding of the genetic gender gap and for a change to the male-centric, one-size-fits-all view of medical studies.

But if women have greater advantage genetically, where did the prevailing idea of fragile female biology come from? In The Gendered Brain the cognitive neuroscientist Gina Rippon traces the ideas of women’s physical inferiority to the 18th century, and later to the brain science of the 19th century. Even after the development of new brain-imaging technologies showed how similar brains are, the idea of the ‘male’ and ‘female’ brain has remained remarkably persistent.

Producer: Katy Hickman