The author of a recent BMJ editorial claims that: “In summary, the general deceleration in mortality improvements in many high income countries since 2010 has been compounded by periodic bad winters.“
The English suburbs are dying. Years of austerity have slowly changed the landscape. Poverty is now common in the suburbs. Since 2014 life expectancy has been falling across most of England, especially in the suburbs.
I came home this evening to hear the local BBC news begin with the headline ‘Oxford hospitals NHS trust suspended midwife services‘
Audio recording of the Keynote Lecture given by Danny Dorling at the annual British Society for Population Studies conference, Winchester, September 12th 2018
‘And you, my father, there on that sad height, Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray. Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light’ (Dylan Thomas, 1947)
In June 2018 the UK Office for National Statistics (ONS) released data for England that revealed mortality rates to be rising across the country. This rise in mortality rates had occurred even after having taken out the likely impact of population ageing.
Britain in 2025 will be very different from today. London and the UK reached peak inequality in 2018.
In early 2018, Britain reached a peak of income inequality. The last peak was in 1913, and so much goes so wrong when inequality peaks.
Despite the evidence DHSC claims “..generally people are living longer.” The government’s response is not sufficient. Persistent concerns from academics, doctors, professional bodies, and public health experts have been consistently disregarded by the DHSC
In hindsight we should have seen it coming. But none of us did, or at least no one who looks for the best in others.
Hidden in the detail of these figures was the news that Britain’s finance and insurance industries had shrunk, albeit only by a tenth of one percent.
The majority of the poorest fifth of children living in the UK have no summer holiday – or any holiday at all each year – and this has been the case for at least a decade now. However people are now learning to lower their expectations.
The last time inequality peaked in the UK was around 1913/1914. It appears to be peaking again this summer.
In the eight years since the May 2010 general election, the health of people living in the United Kingdom has faltered.
Yes we need a basic income. Yes we will get one. But we in the UK will very probably have to wait until other European countries have had one for some time.