Behaviour has an important role in health disparities—for example, young men take greater risks, causing injury and violent death, and men smoke more. 1 In industrialised countries women are born with an advantage; their healthy life expectancy is two years longer and their life expectancy six years longer than those of men. 2 This advantage is prominent in childhood; girls are more likely to survive the first five years of life than boys. 2 However, does this female advantage endure in parts of the world where gender discrimination exists? We present the case of South Asia to illustrate the role that gender has on health.