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Friday, 29 April 2005 10:43

BNN: British Nursing News Online · www.bnn-online.co.uk

Rich-poor health gap widens

The health inequalities between Britain’s richest and poorest communities are at their widest since Victorian times, a report says.

Despite the Government’s intention to reduce the disparity, which widened throughout the 1980s and 1990s, new research has found that inequalities in life expectancy continued to grow in the early years of the 21st century.

The 10-year study showed life expectancy in the countries most prosperous areas rising at a greater pace than in the poorest areas.

Among men, the difference between the council with the lowest life expectancy (Glasgow City) and the one with the highest (East Dorset) had risen to 11 years, the biggest since Victorian times.

The report, published in the British Medical Journal, said that wealth disparities had been growing since the 1980s. The poorest 10 per cent of society now share 3 per cent of the nation’s income, while the richest tenth received more than a quarter.

Report co-author Danny Dorling said poverty was the factor most likely to have caused the health gap to widen.

He added that, based on latest income figures, we can expect to see the gap narrow slightly.

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