Scientists have finally put an end to the age-old battle of the sexes, by claiming that men are the weaker sex.
Professor Marek Glezerman, a gender-based medicine expert, examined 66,000 births at Israel's Rabin Medical Centre between 1995 and 2006, and concluded that baby boys are more at risk of complications in the womb and more likely to have difficult deliveries, reports The Daily Express.
And the gender gap remains when they grow up, as men are more vulnerable to infections and less able to withstand disease than women, research suggests.
In the study, which has been presented to the Israel Society for Gender Based Medicine, Glezerman found that pregnancies with a male foetus were more often complicated and carried greater risk of difficult or premature delivery.
He said: "Men are known to have a shorter life span, are more susceptible to infections and have less chance of withstanding disease than women."
"In short, men are the weaker sex."
Glezerman said: "Males are also associated with higher risk in the neonatal period after birth and are more likely to expose themselves to risky behaviour later in life."
Boys may take more chances as the result of peer pressure, and testosterone in their bloodstream could also lead to more dangerous behaviour, he claimed.
"Men become soldiers, construction workers, and work as firefighters. They take on these risks quite naturally to protect their society, and they're trained to do this without question," he said.