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Introduction
This report presents the latest figures on male and female health expectancy, at birth and at age 65, for the UK and its four constituent countries in 2004. While life expectancy provides an estimate of average expected life-span, health expectancy partitions total life expectancy into years free from health-related problems and years lived in ill-health.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) produces two measures of health expectancy: healthy life expectancy (HLE), defined as expected years of life in 'good' or 'fairly good' health; and disability-free life expectancy (DFLE), defined as expected years of life free from limiting long-standing illness or disability. The methods and the data sources used to calculate health expectancies are reported in detail in the article 'Review of sources and methods to monitor healthy life expectancy' published in Health Statistics Quarterly 26.l
Table 1 shows the 2004 figures for life expectancy, HLE and DFLE at birth and at age 65 by sex for the UK and each constituent country, along with their corresponding 95 per cent confidence intervals.
Healthy life expectancy, 2004
In 2004, on average, males in the UK could expect to live in 'good' or 'fairly good' health (HLE) for 67.9 years at birth and 12.5 years at age 65. For females, the equivalent figures were 70.3 years and 14.5 years, respectively.
Of the four constituent countries of the UK, England had the highest HLE at birth for both sexes. This was also true for females at age 65, but the highest HLE for males at this age was in Northern Ireland.
For males at birth, HLE in England was significantly higher than in the other three countries Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The lowest estimate of HLE at birth was for Scotland at 65.6 years, 2.3 years lower than the estimate for the UK. At age 65, HLE was significantly higher in Northern Ireland and England, 12.8 and 12.7 years respectively, than in Scotland where HLE was 11.5 years.
For females at birth and at age 65, HLE was significantly higher in England than in Wales and Northern Ireland. While HLE estimates for Scotland at birth were the second highest in the UK at 69.6 years, this country had the lowest life expectancy. As a consequence, it...