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Indicators of Sustainable Development for Scotland
Indicator 24. Health
Life expectancy at birth (years)
Life expectancy at birth (years)
Year | 1991-1993 | 1992-1994 | 1993-1995 | 1994-1996 | 1995-1997 | 1996-1998 | 1997-1999 | 1998-2000 |
Males | 71.5 | 71.7 | 71.9 | 72.1 | 72.2 | 72.4 | 72.6 | 72.8 |
Females | 77.1 | 77.3 | 77.4 | 77.6 | 77.8 | 77.9 | 78.1 | 78.2 |
Source: Government Actuary's Department
The relevance of the indicator
Sustainable development includes a healthy nation in which everyone can live in good health or has access to help if that is not the case.
Choice of Indicator
An indicator of "expected years of healthy life" is currently being developed. This will take into account the quality of life as well as years of life.
Detailed definition and source details
Life expectancy at birth for a particular time period is an estimate of the number of years a new born baby would survive if they were to experience the average age specific mortality rates of that time period throughout their entire life. Therefore the figures reflect the mortality rates at the particular time period and not the number of years that a baby born in that time period could expect to live since death rates are likely to change in the future. The figures have been extracted from complete ungraduated annual life tables prepared by the Government Actuary's Department. Life expectancy figures are presented as 3 year rolling averages to smooth out variation in death rates between years.
Trends
Throughout the 1990's, life expectancy at birth has continued to increase steadily for both males and females. There has been an increase of around 0.2 years of life in each year for both males and females.
Further disaggregation
Life expectancy figures are available by health board and local authority areas for:
1995-97 in
Health Service Quarterly 9, Spring 200152
1997-99 in
Health Service Quarterly 11, Autumn 200153, and
1998-2000 in
Health Statistics Quarterly 13, Spring 200254
Within the UK for 1998 to 2000, England had the highest life expectancy at birth at 80.3 years for females and 75.5 years for males. Scotland had the lowest life expectancy at 78.2 years for females and 72.9 years for males. Within Scotland there are regional differences. For 1998 to 2000, Orkney had the highest life expectancy at birth for females at 81.3 years and the Borders had the highest for males at 75.3 years. Greater Glasgow had the lowest life expectancy for both females and males at 76.8 years and 70.5 years respectively.
Target
No current target. An indicator of "expected years of healthy life" is currently being developed. This will take into account the quality of life as well as years of life.
Action
Our policy for improving health is set out in
Towards a Healthier Scotland55 (1999). This combines three approaches:
addressing the many wider causes of ill health by addressing life circumstances;
influencing lifestyles to minimise the health related lifestyle behaviours that lead to preventable early death; and
focusing on priority health topics, concentrating on the major preventable diseases and on improving child, mental, oral and sexual health.
A great deal of action is under way which is likely to improve health. It can be summarised as:
Major investments: 15 million over three years in four national health demonstration projects, 100 million over three years in the Health Improvement Fund and the 34.5 million NOF-funded network of Healthy Living Centres
Specific Health Department led actions in relation to smoking, diet, alcohol, drug misuse, physical activity, mental health, sexual health, oral and dental health and other topics.
Activity across the Executive and beyond, including, for example, health promoting and new community schools, the warm deal initiative, the 350 million package for central heating for pensioners and social tenants and the Working Families Tax Credit.
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