Mancunians have the highest proportion of avoidable deaths per head of population in England and Wales MailOnline’s fascinating map reveals.
Avoidable deaths are those classed by the UK’s statistics body as either preventable or treatable among people under the age of 75.
Examples include fatalities from vaccine-preventable disease like whooping cough or cancer cases where a patient might have had different outcome had they received care earlier.
Higher rates are seen as a damming indication of the population’s general health as well as a sign that people are struggling to access timely healthcare.
Nationally the rate of such deaths per 100,000 head of population, a figure that allows statisticians to compare results between different areas, was 238 deaths per 100,000 people in England, and 274 deaths per 100,000 in Wales.
However, some parts of the country had rates far in excess of the national average.
Analysis by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which broke down rates by NHS area, found people in Manchester had the highest figure in the country.
Mancunians recorded 316 avoidable deaths per 100,000 people, the highest rate in both England and Wales and a third above the national average.
In real terms this meant 7,266 people in the Manchester region died from entirely preventable or treatable health conditions.
Other areas in England that recorded the highest rates were South Yorkshire with 299 deaths per 100,000 people and the Black Country in the West Midlands with 292 such deaths. These represented 3,608 and 2,907 actual deaths respectively.
In contrast, people in Surrey recorded the lowest avoidable death rate in England at just 172 deaths per 100,000. This represented 1,559 fatalities.
For Wales, Aneurin Bevan University Health Board in the nation’s south-east region recorded the highest avoidable death rate at 315 fatalities per 100,000 people. This represented 1,728 actual avoidable deaths.
This was followed by Swansea Bay University Health Board in the south-west of Wales and Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board in south Wales with 307 and 281 deaths per 100,000 people respectively.
Swansea Bay University Health Board recorded 1,728 actual deaths while Cwm Taf Morgannwg University Health Board recorded 1,152.
Powys Teaching Health Board in eastern Wales recorded the lowest avoidable death rate in the nation at just 215 deaths per 100,000 population with 322 actual fatalities.
Wales’s overall higher avoidable death rate comes as other data from the Labour-run nation shows one in 20 patients in its NHS are waiting a year for treatment compared to just 0.5 per cent of those in England.
ONS data analysing the different avoidable death rates per region doesn’t breakdown the fatalities by cause of death.
But national figures show the number of deaths from alcohol and drugs are on the rise.
Fatalities from substance abuse rose to almost 13,000 in England and in excess of 800 in Wales in 2022.
Both figures represent significant rises compared to pre-pandemic figures, when the tally was 10,511 and 667 respectively.
Experts have blamed excess boozing during the Covid pandemic as well as increasing opiate abuse — including heroin and prescription drugs — for blighting the lives of Britons.
Commenting on the overall data, Veena Raleigh, senior fellow of the thinktank The King’s Fund, said it demonstrated the state of accessible healthcare in the UK.
‘This is both a damning indictment of the quality of our public health policies and healthcare services, and yet more evidence of the poor and deteriorating state of the population’s health,’ she said.
‘With the NHS waiting list for treatments standing at over seven million, including over 400,000 people waiting for potentially life-saving heart care, and long waits to see a GP, the prognosis for improved population health in the short to medium term looks bleak.’
She also highlighted how many of the areas in England with the higher avoidable death rates were also areas where people were poorer suggested inequality was killing some Brits before their time.
‘This heavy burden of avoidable ill health and mortality has devastating consequences for individuals, families, communities and the economy,’ she said.
‘Preventing ill-health and reducing premature deaths is surely one of the biggest challenges of our age.’
Another concerning aspect of the overall ONS data on avoidable deaths was such fatalities being on the rise among children in England.
In 2022, 1,248 such deaths among newborns-to-19-year-olds were recorded, a rate of almost 10 per 100,000 population.
This is a rise from the previous two years when the rate was about 9 and 8 deaths per 100,000 in 2021 and 2020 respectively.
However, analysis suggests that rather than a rise this is in fact the country returning to post-pandemic norms.
Data that breaks down these avoidable deaths by cause shows the number of children who died of injury and disease collapsed during the lockdown years of 2020 and 2021, compared to historical norms.
It is suspected that this is related to lockdown disrupting the usual activities and exposures that resulted in these avoidable deaths.
So, while figures for 2022 are rising compared to the most recent years this to a level on par to that seen pre-pandemic.
Manchester recorded 316 avoidable deaths per 100,000 people, the highest rate in both England and a third above the national average
Fatalities from substance abuse have continued to soar compared to pre-pandemic with 25.9 deaths per 100,000 in England in 2022, and 30.2 per 100,000 in Wales (stock image)
