Thursday, April 17, 2014

One in four Maori baby boys won't live to 65?

A similar headline appears in today's New Scotsman:

One in four baby boys in Glasgow won’t live to 65
A QUARTER of boys born in Glasgow between 2010 and 2012 will not live to see their 65th birthday, according to research which shows the city has the lowest life expectancy in Britain.
Figures from the Office for National Statistics reveal public health problems continue to ail Scotland’s largest city, at a time when it is preparing to host the Commonwealth Games.
The findings show that only 75 per cent of boys and 85 per cent of girls born in the city will reach their 65th birthday.
The average life expectancy of babies born in Glasgow between 2010 and 2012 was 72.6 years for boys and 78.5 years for girls.

In 2010-12, the Maori male life expectancy is 72.8 - pretty close. So if the methodology stacks up here, so will the finding. (Of course it might not. Conceivably  the extremes may be greater. For example, a third of Maori baby boys might not make 65 but the survivors have longer life expectancies than the Scottish cohort.)

The good news is Maori are catching up.

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