Metric gives fuller picture than life expectancy, which is simply how long people live, says Health Foundation
People in UK spend fewer years in good health than a decade ago, study finds
The obesity crisis, the record 2.8 million working-age Britons too sick to do so and the rising prevalence of mental illness are sobering reminders that the UK population’s health is not good.
But even for those familiar with this troubling situation, the Health Foundation’s analysis of the latest Office for National Statistics figures on healthy life expectancy sheds uncomfortable new light on the country’s poor and deteriorating health.
The government is trying to rescue the NHS from an ever-rising demand for care, to grapple with public finances hamstrung in part by lost tax revenue from those unable to earn, and to pursue its key goal of economic growth. For Downing Street, the thinktank’s findings should be quietly terrifying.
