While you always thought it was a forbidden sexy fantasy scenario to live with more than one woman at a time, it turns out you might be better off without multiple women. Studies show that polygamous men have 4x the risk of blocked heart vessels, compared to boring old guys with just one wife.
“We found an association between an increasing number of wives and the severity and number of coronary blockages,” stated Dr. Amin Daoulah, a cardiologist at the King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in regards to his research, which was presented at the 2015 Asian Pacific Society of Cardiology Congress.
In Saudi Arabia, where the study was conducted, having more than one wife is perfectly legal – in line with the religious laws outlined in the Koran, Islam’s holy book. In Islam, men are allowed to marry up to four different women, as long as they can support all of them and treat each wife and her children equally.
“It seems likely that the stress of doing that for several spouses and possibly several families of children is considerable,” Daoulah said.
Dr. Daoulah’s study followed 687 men (of an average age of 58 years old) who were being treated for heart disease at hospitals in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. More than 50% had a history of high blood pressure and heart disease. The polygamous study subjects had 4.6 times the risk of having narrowed coronary arteries, and 2.6 times the risk of having multiple narrowed arteries. While the study was revealing, a direct link between more wives and more heart disease could not be concretely established, since there exist mitigating factors, like genetics, diet & nutrition, etc.
Some scientists have argued that polygamy makes biological and evolutionary sense for men, since as with any animal, humans too have the instinctual drive to mate and reproduce as much as possible.
