ARCTIC HEALTH SERIES: Finnish Income Inequality Causes Health Inequality
Socioeconomic factors are increasingly affecting Finns’ health and life expectancy, according to a new survey from the National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL). The life expectancy of low-income groups has not risen since the 1990s.
Differences in health have risen strongly in the last 25 years, particularly in terms of life expectancy for people in different income bands.
In 2007 the difference between the life expectancy of those in the lowest income fifth of the population and those in the highest was 12.5 years for men and 6.8 years for women. Seven years earlier the difference was 9.9 years for me and 4.9 years for women.
Life expectancy among the lowest-income twenty percent has not risen since the 1990s, while life expectancy for other income groups has risen steadily since the 1980s.
Rise in Income Inequality Evident in Health Inequality
According to the THL, the reason for the rise in health inequality is that Finnish social policy sometimes conflicts with health objectives.
Health is adversely affected by income differences, poverty and unemployment. These factors have weakened health among the lowest income groups in such a way that ad hoc measures can not repair the damage, says the institute.
The institute believes that measures to combat health inequality would also be cost-effective. If health problems among low-income people were reduced to the level of highly educated people, the social and health ministry would save between 1.5 billion and 2 billion euros a year, or 15 percent of its budget.
Narrowing the gap in health outcomes has been a central goal of Finnish health policy since the end of the 1970s, and it has also been a goal of the last two governments. It has also been a goal of many programmes, committees and projects.
According to the THL, reductions in health inequality would need broader co-operation across government departments, as well as greater political will. Social and health service providers should take care to ensure that the services should reduce rather than exacerbate differences between social groups.
YLE
