For a few hours on Wednesday 30 June 2021, a report released by University College London’s Institute of Health Equity hit the headlines. “‘Jaw-dropping’ fall in life expectancy in poor areas of England,” reported The Guardian.
The key statistic in the UCL report was that deaths involving COVID-19 had resulted in life expectancy in the north-west region of England falling by 1.6 years for men and 1.2 years for women. This is around 25% worse than for England as a whole, where life expectancy had fallen by 1.3 years and 0.9 years, for men and women respectively.
Paraphrasing the report’s author, leading public health expert Professor Marmot, the Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Partnership, which commissioned the report, said: “If the government is serious about levelling up health inequities, equity of health and wellbeing must be at the heart of government and business strategy rather than narrow economic goals.”
