But Lambeth residents are among the most likely to die before 75.
Residents of Richmond are among the least likely to die before the age of 75, according to new data released by Public Health England.
The Longer Lives survey reveals that the borough has the second lowest rate of early deaths out of 150 local authorities in the country.
Between 2009-2011, Richmond had 202 premature deaths per 100,000 people. Manchester, which came bottom of the table, had 455 premature deaths per 100,000 people in the same period.
The borough had the 4th lowest premature death rates for cancer as well as for heart disease and stroke.
Councillor Tony Arbour, Cabinet Member Performance and Community Safety, said the survey proves that what the council is doing is working.
“The evidence is clear – a person is more likely to suffer an early death if they drink excessively, do not exercise, are overweight, or smoke.
“We are doing everything we can to ensure our residents are living longer lives and although our early death rates are the second lowest in the country there is still more to do.”
The results revealed a huge variation in death rates across the country, with those in the North West of England at the greatest risk of dying early.
“This shocking variation in early and unnecessary deaths means people’s lives are needlessly cut short, and that cannot continue unchecked,” said Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt.
“I want areas to use the data released today to identify local public health challenges like smoking, drinking and obesity and to take action to help achieve our ambition for saving 30,000 lives a year by 2020.”
As expected, the results generally show that the least socio-economically deprived areas have a much better premature mortality rate. Like Richmond, all of the authorities in the top five are classed as ‘least deprived’ areas.
However, Kensington and Chelsea, which has only an ‘average’ socio-economically deprived rating, has one of the ‘best’ rates in the country, coming 8th overall and 1st when compared to other ‘average’ authorities across the country.
Other South West London authorities which were also labelled as the ‘best’ in the country include Kingston (11th) and Merton (29th).
Lambeth failed to score so highly, labelled as among the ‘worst’ for premature mortality outcomes with 322 early deaths per 100,000 in 2009-2011. This placed them 121st out of 150.
In 2011, 1 in 3 deaths in England was under the age of 75.
Photo courtesy of tedeytan, with thanks.
Follow us @SW_Londoner
