Fancy That V
Male life expectancy in Rushey Green ward, Lewisham 1999 to 2003 - 72.1 years
Male life expectancy in Rushey Green ward, Lewisham 2000 to 2004 - 71.8 years
Male life expectancy in Gaza Strip, Palestine (2008 est) - 71.01 years
Male life expectancy in Queens Gate ward, Kensington & Chelsea, 2000 to 2004 - 86.8 years
July 14th, 2008 at 6:39 am
Why not have the comparators for women too?
Rushey Green - 1999 - 2003: 78.2
Rushey Green - 2000 - 2004: 78.9
Gaza - 73.7
Queens Gate - 2000 - 2004: 88.8
And why not add the 2001 - 2005 figures?
Rushey Green Males: 71.9
Rushey Green Females: 79.1
Queens Gate Males - 86.8
Queens Gate Females - 89
I’m not sure what all of that proves, and I’d be interested to know why you chose Queens Gate ward as your London comparator.
You might also find this paper from the PCT of interest, showing as it does the gradual rise in life expectancy across the borough (particularly since 1997), but pointing out that our life expectancy remains below the London and England averages.
July 14th, 2008 at 7:09 am
as i linked to the source, people can do whatever comparisons they want andrew
as for here - self interest, i’m a male living in rushey green
as to what this all proves, and regardless what period you choose, there’s a 15 year differential of male life (10 years for females) expectancy between rushy green and queens gate areas which are only about 8 miles away from each other, as to what this proves well i’m sure it says something about the inequitable distribution of resources between people who live almost cheek & jowl together
adding in the 2001-2005 figures doesn’t change anything in regards to that fact
As to queens gate being chosen, it highlights the gross inequalities that exist between people who live not much more than a stone’s throw away from each other, a lot of people thought back in 1997 when labour were elected that these kind of inequalities would lessen, instead at best they’ve stabilised and become structuralised and at worst have got even deeper
i more and more believe that the level of inequality in society rather than the absolute/overall wealth position is at the root of many of the societal problems we have today, glossing over these inequalities won’t make them go away.
July 14th, 2008 at 9:33 am
i suppose if i’d wanted to be really sensationalist i could have written about the difference in average male life expectancy between the good people of Calton in Glasgow (54) and that of the burghers of Surrey Docks in Southwark (90), a whopping 36 year difference, however that would be appealing far too much to my tabloid sentimentalities (and the surrey docks figure looks like some statistical anomaly)
July 14th, 2008 at 11:05 am
I had a quick look at the report you linked to Andrew (thanks for that) and the findings of that seem to chime with what i’m saying as well
Your right that it points to the increasing life expectancy across the borough, however the point of my original post was to highlight the inequalities that exist and continue to exist/increase over recent years which the following quote from this report makes quite clear:-
“while the national and London life expectancies have been steadily rising, the same does not apply to Lewisham over the period [1991 to 2005]. From 1991-3 to 1996-8 (perhaps coincidentally, the period of the “Working for Patients” internal market) life expectancy for males was essentially unchanged while that for females declined by about nine months; the gap between Lewisham and the rest of London and England widened by about a year for males, and for females widened by 18 months. Thirdly, that from 1996-8 to 2002-4, life expectancy for both sexes has increased faster than the national rate (with a blip for females in 2001-3), and the gap has narrowed, THOUGH IS STILL MUCH WIDER THAN AT THE START OF THE PERIOD. Fourthly, male life expectancy did not improve 2003-5, and the reasons for this are as yet unclear”
So at present the life expectancy gap between lewisham and the national rate is larger than it was back in 1991 (with the most recent years showing an even more marked increase in that gap with male life exectancy static in lewisham but rising in london overall and nationally) pointing to an overall increase in inequality over that period
So all told, this points towards an increasing prevelance of inequality in our society today (along with huge increases in the numbers of families in fuel poverty, ongoing increases in child poverty despite pledges to eradicate it completely, continued lack of social mobility, vastly increased income & wealth differentials etc.) and it’s no surprise that this correlates with the raft of societal problems that we are confronted with at present
July 18th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
All the statistics seem to show that equality in British society reached a peak in 1979, and it has been downhill ever since. Although there have been some improvements at the bottom end since New Labour came into power (in particular, I think child poverty has fallen significantly), the trend continues. At the top of the scale, the concentration of more wealth into fewer hands is extraordinary. (See Ruth Levitas’ brilliant piece here: http://www.lwbooks.co.uk/journals/soundings/class_and_culture/levitas.html
“Since 1979, the proportion of national income taken by the bottom 30 per cent of the population has dropped from 17 per cent to 11 per cent, while that taken by the top 10 per cent has risen from just over 20 per cent to almost 30 per cent. Put another way, in 1979, the top 10 per cent had five times the share of national income of the bottom ten per cent. In 2005, the ratio had increased to eighteen to one”
The Gaza Strip comparison, I think, is very helpful: British liberals like to wring their hands over distant suffering (especially if they can blame America and the Jews instead of themselves) while turning a blind eye to their own country.
(While writing this, that punk song by Patrick Fitzgerald popped into my head: “You’re too busy fighting your irrelevant battles to know what’s going on in your own back yard.”)
July 18th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
indeed
here’s a few bullet points from the latest IFS report on inequality
- Relative poverty has risen for the second year in a row
- Unexpectedly large rise in pensioner poverty
- Child poverty has risen for the second year in a row
- Income inequality rises again
- incomes grow fastest for the rich
and to sum up
“the Gini Coefficient – a commonly used measure of income inequality – is unchanged since 2005-06. But it remains at a level higher than that which Labour inherited and equal to its highest level seen since the start of a consistent time series in 1961.”
and bear in mind that gini only measures inequalities in income, not wealth, so there’s a heap more inequality that’s not picked up by that measure
the smell of new labour - and all this won’t take any account of the disproportianate impact that rising food, energy and housing costs have, and will continue to have this year, along with the undoubedtly asymmetrical impacts that any actual recession and related unemployment will bring - it’s a sad state of affairs when the level on inequality is at it’s highest point for near on 50 years - and that’s the good times!
http://www.ifs.org.uk/pr/hbai_pr1.pdf
December 7th, 2008 at 11:04 am
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