Researchers Say Single Fathers Face More Physical And Mental Health Issues

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Before some year researchers found out that single mother between the ages of 16 and 49 may face an increased rate of disability and poor health in their life. Now, some researchers from Toronto, Canada studied the health issue in single dad.

As stated in Reuters, single dads are twice as likely to report poor physical and mental health as fathers with partners. Single fathers experience the same stress as single mothers and one of the main reason behind it is low income and unemployment.

Everyone is aware that lone parenthood has a negative effect on parents' health. So, the single father stands as equal with single mothers in terms of physical and mental health issues.

16 per cent of families is single-parent households in Canada, 27 per cent of families in US and 25 per cent in the UK. Generally, men are disinclined to their issues regarding physical and mental health.  

In this research, responses were taken from 1058 lone fathers in Canadian Community Health Surveys between 2001 and 2013. Lone fathers rate their physical and mental health poor/fair twice as likely as fathers with partners.

Generally, single fathers have stress for caregiving and raising children whereas single mothers have stress due to income problem.

The majority of lone fathers included in the research were over age 45 out of which 15 percent were unemployed. One in five earned less than $30,000, one in five was having chronic medical conditions, and one in ten had an anxiety disorder.

After setting parameters such as race and age, single dads who were recorded with poorer physical and mental health were more succumbed to unemployment and lower pay.

As written in Fox News, one of the researchers was concerned that public policy changes could help more single fathers access social assistance and child support.

It is evident from the facts cited above that the reported level of health issues faced by single dads is almost two times than mental and health issues faced by married men.