Inequality is a headline grabber. We’ve all heard about executive pay meaning CEO’s earn more than an average year’s salary in just two working days, but perhaps what we don’t hear so much is the inequality rife in the UK’s health.
Today, the ONS released statistics on the inequalities of life expectancies as determined by area deprivation. Men in deprived areas have life expectancies nine years shorter than those in the least deprived areas and of those years lived, the years of “good health” for deprived men is 52 years, compared to 70 for the least deprived. For women, the life expectancy gap is less, at a six year difference (as opposed to nine) but the disparity of their lives spent in ‘good health’ is greater. These statistics tell a story that is familiar to most people; health and life expectancies are damaged by deprivation, which then in turn fuels said deprivation in a brutal cycle.
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