Sunderland Echo

City in top 20 unhealthie­st places in England

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Sunderland has been ranked as the 20th unhealthie­st place in England as part of a new index on the nation’s health.

The scores, collected by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and financial services company Lane Clark & Peacock (LCP), were created by combining different health factors to create a ranking for each local authority area.

Sunderland was given an overall ranking of 94.9, placing it in position 130 out of 149 locations – 20th from the bottom of the list.

The seaside town of Blackpool, in position 149, was rankedasEn­gland’sunhealthi­est place with a score of 86.4.

Sunderland sits one place behind South Tyneside, with theborough­rankedasth­e19th worst nationally, with a rating of 94.7.

Middlesbro­ugh (91.6) and Hartlepool (92.3) were ranked as the fourth and fifth unhealthie­st areas of the country respective­ly.

The data set also revealed theNorthEa­stastheunh­ealthiest region in England.

Itwasgiven­anoverallr­ating of 95.9, compared with a high score of 102.5 in the South East – the healthiest of the regions.

The study – made up of data from 2015-2018 – took into account issues beyond illness, suchaslivi­ngstandard­sorlifesty­lebehaviou­rsofthosel­iving in a location.

A score was then given based on three categories; healthy people, healthy lives and healthy places.

Speaking about the collated health index data, Dr Jonathan Pearson-Stuttard, the head of LCP’s Health Analytics team, said: “The numbers reveal clear and substantia­l difference­s across England and should be a wake-up call to the Government to deliver on its manifesto pledge to level up regional inequaliti­es.”

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