Twenty years of ill-health: the grim cost of deprivation

THE most deprived Scots can expect to live almost twice as many years in ill health compared with their more affluent counterparts, figures show.

Statistics published by the Scottish Public Health Observatory (ScotPHO) revealed that men in the most deprived fifth of the population would spend 20.1 years of their life not being in good health, compared with 12.6 years in the most affluent group.

Deprived women can expect to spend even longer in ill health, at 24.3 years compared with 13.8 among the most well-off.

Campaigners said much more needed to be done to improve the health of those living in the most deprived parts of Scotland, where higher rates of smoking, drinking and poor diets increase their risk of illness. The Scottish Government said it had plans in place to tackle health inequalities, including giving children the best start in life and tackling unemployment.

Yesterday’s figures showed that in 2009-10, overall male life expectancy at birth ranged from 81 years in the least deprived group to 70.1 years in the most deprived.

But when it came to so-called healthy life expectancy – years spent in good health – it ranged from 68.5 in the most well-off to and 50 in the poorest.

The picture was similar for women. Their life expectancy at birth ranged from 84.2 years in the least deprived to 76.8 years in the most deprived, while healthy life expectancy ranged from 70.5 to 52.5 years.

There was also a small drop in healthy life expectancy for the whole population from 79 in 2009 to 78 in 2010 in men, and from 77.3 to 76.7 in women, but experts said the fall was not statistically significant.

The figures also showed that overall life expectancy has improved in the last decade.

Boys born in 2010 can expect to live to 76.3 on average, compared with 73.2 in 2000. For girls, the figure rose from 78.7 to 80.7.

Despite the progress made, ScotPHO said that both life expectancy and healthy life expectancy in Scotland tended to be worse than in the UK as a whole, and that Scotland had one of the lowest life expectancies in western Europe.

Margaret Watt, chair of the Scotland Patients Association, said the figures showing the gap in healthy life expectancy between the richest and poorest in Scotland were “shocking”. She added: “It is quite an embarrassment for us to be putting these figures out showing this gap.”

Health campaigners stressed the need to tackle factors such as smoking and alcohol use.

Vicky Crichton, Cancer Research UK’s public affairs manager, said: “We know that more than 100,000 cancers – equivalent to one third of all those diagnosed in the UK each year – are caused by smoking, unhealthy diets, alcohol and excess weight.

A Scottish Government spokesman said: “We have seen a general upward trend in healthy life expectancy in Scotland in recent years. The small decrease between 2009 and 2010 is not statistically significant, and, given this is only the second year since the introduction of the new methodology to calculate healthy life expectancy, it is difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from it.

“However, we realise more work is needed to remove health inequalities and increase life expectancy for all Scots.”

He said the government’s Equally Well framework sets out the strategy for reducing health inequalities, with a focus on the underlying causes of poor health and health inequalities.