HEALTH


The health sector is well served by statistics and there are many different approaches to judging performance. Looking at the broadest level – life expectancy and death rates – NSW health continued to improve between 2000 and 2005. During the same period, the life expectancy at birth of men improved by 2.1 years to reach 78.5 years, and the death rate for all persons fell from 6.9 to 5.9 per 1000 persons.

Life Expectancy and Mortality Rates
		2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005
Life expectancy male(a)	years	76.4	76.9	77.3	77.7	78.0	78.5
Life expectancy female(a)	years	81.9	82.4	82.6	82.9	83.3	83.3
Standardised death rate per 1,000 population(b)	rate	6.9	6.6	6.6	6.4	6.3	5.9
nya not yet available
(a) Based on three years of population and deaths data.
(b) Age standardised to the 2001 Australian population.
Source: Deaths, Australia (ABS cat. no. 3302.0).

Deaths per 100,000 persons from heart disease and cerebrovascular disease have declined since 2000, however, deaths from cancer have increased from 163 to 177 per 100,000 persons in 2005.

Deaths of Young People

One goal of health systems is to reduce preventable deaths – those related to risk behaviours or where earlier medical interventions may have prevented death. In 2005, nearly half of all deaths of young men and a third of young women aged 15–34 years in NSW, were due to suicide, transport accidents or accidental drug overdoses (418 persons).

In 2005, as many young people died from suicide (173 persons) as from transport accidents (167 persons), and four times as many young men (330) died from suicide, transport or drug causes, as young women (88).

In 2005, the number of deaths from transport accidents were highest between the ages 20 and 29 years.

Deaths from suicide and accidental drug overdose were highest between the ages 30 and 49 years. At these ages more people die from either suicide or accidental drug overdose than from a transport fatality.