From deep-fried Mars bars to neoliberal political attacks: explaining the Scottish mortality disadvantage (Editorial)

A selection of abstracts of clinically relevant papers from other journals. The abstracts on this page have been chosen and edited by John R. Radford.

Abstract

'Scotland (has) suffered disproportionately from the adoption of neoliberalism'.

Main

Mackenbach JP. Eur J Public Health 2012; 22: 751

Can diet, smoking or alcohol consumption be the reason why Scotland has a lower life expectancy than other parts of the UK? In this Editorial that drills down the substantive paper (McCartney G, Walsh D et al. Eur J Public Health 2012; 22: 756–760), it is proposed that 'a neoliberal ''political attack'' by the Conservative government' in the 1980s resulted in greater inequalities in Scotland compared with the rest of the UK, with accompanying unhealthy lifestyles for the disenfranchised. Neoliberalism was measured using the 'Index of Economic Freedom'. It was also reported that those European countries with a high index also had smaller increases in life expectancy. It is argued, that this neoliberalism hypothesis 'takes us way beyond such proximal risk factors', including the deep-fried Mars bar!