Women carry a higher genetic risk of depression, new study says

(Natasha May/ The Guardian) — Women carry a higher genetic risk of depression, a new study has found.

Claiming to be the largest genetic study to date on sex differences in major depression, the research published on Wednesday in Nature Communications has found 16 genetic variants linked to depression in women and eight in men.

The study, led by Australia’s QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, showed a large proportion of the variants associated with depression were shared between sexes, but there was a “higher burden of genetic risk in females which could be due to female-specific variants”.

Dr Brittany Mitchell, a senior researcher at QIMR Berghofer’s genetic epidemiology lab, said “we already know that females are twice as likely to suffer from depression in their lifetime than males”. (…)