Nearly half of Korean men suffer from hair loss

Almost half of South Korean men are suffering from hair loss due mainly to stress with some of them willing to give up drinking or sex to get healthy hair, a poll showed Thursday.

According to the survey of 801 Korean men ages 25 to 45 taken by Nielsen Korea, 47 percent of the respondents said they are suffering from hair loss.

Half of them replied that stress is the main reason for their hair loss, with 34 percent saying it's hereditary. Seventy-two percent answered they are currently under stress.

The findings also showed 30 percent first recognized their hair loss at the age of between 25 and 30, with 25 percent doing so between 30 and 35.

Thirty-seven percent of the surveyed said they are willing to abandon drinking for one year to have healthy hair, with 16 percent replying they will not have sex for the same period for the same purpose.

Seventy-five percent of the respondents said they intend to receive treatment for the hair loss, with 86 percent believing that their appearance is important for their life and pride.

An official at German hair care products maker Alpecin, which commissioned the survey, said South Koreans are starting to suffer from hair loss at an increasingly younger age.

A recent study by the Health Insurance Review & Assessment Service showed that 43.5 percent of South Koreans who received treatment for hair loss were in their 20s and 30s, with the number of 20-something patients increasing 7.5 percent from 2012, he said. (Yonhap)