Life expectancy increases to 13 years from North to South.

UK North-South life expectancy divide increases to 13 years 

By STEVE DOUGHTY
Last updated at 6:59 AM on 20th October 2010

A life expectancy gap between England and Scotland is opening wider year by year, new figures showed yesterday.

The age a boy born in the South East of England is likely to reach is now over four years greater than the expectations of a Scottish baby boy.

The gap has grown by seven months since the early 1990s, when the life expectancy difference between boys born in the South East and Scotland was less than three-and-a half years.

A growing difference in lifespan appears to reflect the faster-rising wealth of southern England together with the healthier lifestyles it has made possible.

Unhealthy: The deep-fried Mars bar is a popular treat in Scotland - and seen by many as symbolic of an unhealthy diet

The figures on the life expectancy gap published yesterday by the Office for National Statistics show that the divide between the likely life terms of babies in the richest parts of the south and the worst-off parts of Scotland has stretched to more than 13 years.

Men in the better-off parts of England are now outliving women in the worst-off regions of Scotland by almost seven years, reversing the usual expectation that women will live longer than men.

The shortest lifespans in Britain have long been recorded in Glasgow, where poverty, unemployment, drug and alcohol abuse, and unhealthy diets symbolised by the invention of the deep-fried Mars bar, have contributed to earlier death.

By contrast the most comfortable suburbs of the South East and East, the richest London boroughs, and the retirement zones for the well-off in Dorset and Somerset have regularly noted the longest lives.

However yesterday's figures show the gap is widening in a way likely to cause unease both to politicians anxious to foster equality and to unionists worried about Scotland's pull towards independence.

The ONS said yesterday that its figures showed 'inequalities persisting across the UK'.

In the South East a baby boy born between 2007 and 2009 would expect to live to 79.4 years against 75.4 for a boy born in Scotland, a four-year gap.

For baby girls born at the same time, the South East-Scotland gap was 3.2 years, the difference between lifespans of 83.3 and 80.1 years.

Across the UK, the average life expectancy for a boy born now is 77.9; for a girl 82.0. Across England the life expectancies are 78.3 for boys and 82.3 for girls.

The longest-lived location in England is the London borough of Kensington and Chelsea, where life expectancy for babies is 84.4 for boys and 89.0 for girls.

In Glasgow City the average expected lifetime for a baby is currently 71.1 for a boy and 77.5 for a girl.

Other Scottish areas also feature heavily in the list of places with the lowest life expectancy: West Dunbartonshire, Inverclyde, Refrewshire, North Ayrshire, Dundee and North Lanarkshire have particularly poor records.

In England, Blackpool, Manchester, Liverpool, Salford, and Blackburn are among blackspot locations that appear in bottom ten lists for male and female life expectancy either at birth or from the age of 65.

Worst for long life in Wales in Blaenau Gwent and, in Northern Ireland, Belfast.

A TALE OF TWO NATIONS

HIGHEST LIFE EXPECTANCY AT BIRTH 2007-2009

MEN                                                              WOMEN

Kensington and Chelsea        84.8        Kensington and Chelsea        89.0
Westminster                             83.4        Westminster                             86.5
Epsom and Ewell                     81.8        Hart                                              85.6
South Buckinghamshire        81.7        Epsom and Ewell                      85.6
Wokingham                               81.7        East Dorset                                85.4
South Cambridgeshire           81.6        Richmond upon Thames        85.4
Crawley                                      81.6        Chiltern                                       85.3
Fareham                                    81.4        Vale of White Horse                85.2
Elmbridge                                  81.4        Christchurch                              85.0
East Dorset                               81.4        Guildford                                    84.9

LOWEST LIFE EXPECTANCY AT BIRTH 2007-2009

MEN                                                            WOMEN 

Glasgow City                          71.1          Glasgow City                             77.5
West Dunbartonshire          72.5         West Dunbartonshire             78.4
Inverclyde                                73.1          North Lanarkshire                    78.5
Western Isles                        73.5          East Ayrshire                            78.8
Belfast                                     73.5           Inverclyde                                   79.0
Renfrewshire                         73.7          Manchester                               79.1
Blackpool                                73.7          Blaenau Gwent                          79.1
Dundee City                            73.7          North Ayrshire                          79.2
North Lanarkshire                 73.7          Liverpool                                     79.2
North Ayrshire                       74.0         Renfrewshire                             79.2

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1322014/UK-North-South-life-expectancy-divide-increases-13-years.html#ixzz12tqFGV3C