FactCheck: Glasgow worse than Gaza?
Updated on 07 July 2008
The SNP says that life expectancy in Glasgow East is lower than in the Gaza Strip. FactCheck digs into the numbers.
The claim
"Life expectancy in Glasgow East is lower than the Gaza Strip"
Angus Robertson MP, Good Morning Scotland, Wednesday 2 July 2008
The background
It's a shocking comparison: the idea that life expectancy rates in a part of Britain are lower than in the war-torn Gaza Strip.
In the build-up to 24 July's Glasgow East by-election, the SNP's Westminster leader attacked Labour for presiding "over a situation where the life expectancy in Glasgow East is lower than the Gaza Strip, where 40 per cent of children live in households in poverty and 30 per cent earn less than £350 per week."
It's his first comment that attracted the most attention: "Glasgow as bad as the Gaza Strip, says SNP leader," read a Telegraph headline last week, and Labour hit back, accusing the SNP of "insulting" the people of Glasgow and "misunderstanding" the situation in the war-torn territory.
But do the figures back the nationalists up?
The analysis
First let's look at Glasgow as a whole. The Glasgow City Council area, made up of seven constituencies including Glasgow East, has the lowest life expectancy in the UK.
The most recently available data, for 2004-06, puts life expectancy at birth at 73.7 years overall. For females, it's 77 years. For males it's just 70.5 years.
This measure of life expectancy can't accurately predict the life expectancy of a baby born today; instead, it looks at how long someone would be expected to live based on current life expectancy trends.
Figures are also available for the East Glasgow Community Health and Care Partnership. Despite the name, this doesn't correspond exactly with the Glasgow East constituency - it's slightly larger, including some of a neighbouring council area as well as the contested seat.
Here, the 2004-06 life expectancy is lower still: 69.3 years for males and 76.2 years for females.
It's always worth being cautious when comparing data from different sources - Gaza falls firmly outside the remit of the UK's Office of National Statistics, for example.
For the UK as a whole, life expectancy at birth was 76.9 years for men and 81.3 years for women in 2004-06. In Scotland, it was 74.6 years for men and 79.6 years for women.
What about in the Gaza strip? According to the CIA World Factbook, life expectancy at birth for 2008 is estimated to be 72.34 years. This breaks down to 71.01 years for men and 73.73 years for women.
It's a similar story for Palestine as a whole: based on 2004 data, the World Health Organisation's country profile (if not its official statistics, which don't cover Palestine) puts life expectancy at birth in Palestine at 72.6 years; 71.1 years for males and 74.1 years for females.
UN figures for 2005-2010 put life expectancy at birth in the Palestine at 72 years for men and 75 years for women.
It's always worth being cautious when comparing data from different sources - Gaza falls firmly outside the remit of the UK's Office of National Statistics, for example.
The UK as a whole rides pretty high in the WHO's life expectancy table, in joint 28 of 193, beaten by Japan, Switzerland, Israel and Sweden as well as Ireland, Singapore, Korea, but longer-lived than citizens of the USA, Cuba, and the United Arab Emirates.
But sort the 2006 data by male life expectancy, and Glasgow City's 70.5 years comes below a good 65 countries, Colombia, China, Mexico, Argentina, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Cuba among them.
The verdict
Glasgow as a city has a low life expectancy compared to the UK as a whole, the figure for Glasgow East reflects the situation in the most deprived part of the city.
Life expectancy there - particularly among men - is lower than not only Palestine, but a host of other countries.
To really draw a more rigorous international comparison, you'd need to compare life expectancy in Glasgow East to life expectancy in the poorest part of another country. But for those on the ground, it's still a bleak prognosis.
FactCheck rating: 2
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The sources
Good Morning Scotland, Wednesday 2 July 2008 (relevant comments just after 7.30am)
Glasgow as bad as the Gaza Strip, says SNP leader, Telegraph, 3 July 2008
Life expectancy for administrative areas within Scotland 2004-06 (pdf)
Life expectancy in special areas within Scotland 2004-06 (pdf)
Office for National Statistics: life expectancy
Glasgow Centre for Population Health: East Glasgow profile
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