The National Science Foundation, the federal agency that oversees the U.S. Antarctic Program, published a report in 2022 in which 59% of women said they’d experienced harassment or assault while on the ice, and 72% of women said such behavior was a problem in Antarctica.
But the problem goes beyond the harassment, The Associated Press found. In reviewing court records and internal communications, and in interviews with more than a dozen current and former employees, the AP uncovered a pattern of women who said their claims of harassment or assault were minimized by their employers, often leading to them or others being put in further danger.
I found this study about the differences (but it’s from 2014, please tell me if you find a more recent one) The Impact of Sex and Gender on Adaptation to Space: Executive Summary.
TL;DR female astronauts have, according to the study:
- a higher risk of cancer (a 45-year-old man has a 344-day limit in space to be safe versus a 187-day limit for a 45-year-old woman)
- more orthostatic intolerance
- more UTIs (which makes sense as women on earth are also more likely to have UTIs)
- less vision impairment compared to male astronauts (no clinically significant cases of VIIP syndrome)
- less hearing problems (men show a more rapid decline in the left ear and in general like on Earth)
Keep in mind that this data is not the best because only around 20% of people that had been on the ISS at the time were women and because male astronauts are more likely to come from a military background.
less hearing problems (men show a more rapid decline in the left ear and in general as well)
Did the study mention why the left ear was more of a problem?
