UK performing worst in life expectancy rankings of all G7 countries bar one

The UK has been steadily falling down the life expectancy ranks since the 1950s, and is now ranked 29^th globally.

Researchers writing in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine say the UK is performing the worst in terms of life expectancy out of all G7 countries, apart from the USA.

A significant contributing factor to this drop, they write, is income inequality. Income inequalities rose greatly in the UK during and after the 1980s, and the UK recently became the second most economically unequal country in Europe after Bulgaria, according to research by the OECD.

The researchers say the UK government must now address this “acute crisis” which has been exacerbated by the cost of living crisis.

“A relative worsening of population health is evidence that all is not well,” writes researcher Dr Lucinda Hiam of the University of Oxford. A message that is particularly poignant considering the government recently scrapped its health inequality white paper.

Covid pandemic saw the UK’s life expectancy drop to an all-time low

The researchers show the rankings of the G7 countries (UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the USA) at each decade from 1950 to 2020.

The data shows that while Japan’s life expectancy has markedly approved since the 1950s, and France’s has stayed fairly consistent, the UK’s has plummeted.

In 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic, the UK’s life expectancy dropped to an all-time low – ranking 36^th globally, just above the Maldives, Chile, Costa Rica and Thailand.

“No room for complacency”

The researchers say the relative decline of the UK in the figures is “stark”, adding that the causes of the UK falling down the life expectancy ranks appear to have been decades in the making.

“While politicians invoke global factors, especially the effects of the pandemic and the invasion of Ukraine, the reality is that, as in the 1950s, the country suffers from major structural and institutional weaknesses,” writes researcher Professor Martin McKee, of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.

With inflation still extremely high, the researchers say there is no room for complacency. They write: “Given the current challenges faced by the UK, there is no room for complacency. While life expectancy has increased in absolute terms over recent decades, other, now much more similar countries, are experiencing larger increases.

“It is hard to believe that the UK is facing diminishing marginal returns on its investment in health, while those other countries are at a point in the curve where returns are still much higher.”

Dr Hiam and her co-authors the research highlights that the problems facing the UK are deep-seated and raise serious questions about the path the country is following.