New Zealand Census-Mortality Study

 

Latest news

Ethnic and Socio-economic Disparities in Death Rates No Longer Widening

Wednesday 22 August 2007

Research from the University of Otago, Wellington shows that death rates in New Zealand related to ethnic and socio-economic disparities are no longer widening, and may have even narrowed in the periods 1996-99 to 2001-04. This is in contrast to growing gaps in death rates in the general population in the 1980's and 1990s.

"This apparent plateau in health disparities, and possible turnaround, is of major importance if it can be maintained," says researcher Professor Tony Blakely. More...

Read the full Tracking Disparity report (PDF)

 

New Zealand Census-Mortality Study WebTable Results
This WebTable (funded by the Ministry of Health) makes available to policy and research communities a large range of results from the NZCMS on differences in mortality by age, sex, ethnicity and socioeconomic factors.

Overview

The New Zealand Census-Mortality Study (NZCMS) is part of the Health Inequalities Research Programme, established July 2005. It aims to measure mortality differences by socio-economic status in New Zealand.

In order to do this, we have been working with Statistics New Zealand to anonymously and probabilistically link census records and mortality records, thereby creating cohort studies. This linkage has been achieved for all four censuses (1981, 1986, 1991 and 1996) followed for mortality for three years.

Analyses will then be conducted on these cohorts to:

  • measure the relationship between individual socio-economic factors (e.g. employment status, education, income, occupational class, and asset ownership) and mortality


  • compare the strength of the relationship of socio-economic factors with mortality across time - the four cohort studies traverse a 20-year period of major macro-economic and social change in New Zealand


  • investigate the extent to which smoking acts as an intermediate variable in the relation between socio-economic factors and mortality, using the 1996 census cohort


  • investigate possible contextual effects for variables such as neighbourhood deprivation and income inequality on mortality


  • examine discrepancies in the coding of ethnic group between census and mortality data (the so-called numerator denominator bias). The first stage of this work has been completed. See Technical Report Section for details.

The NZCMS is funded by the Ministry of Health.

NZCMS Investigators

Department of Public Health, Univeristy of Otago, Wellington

Co-investigators external to the Department and previous postgraduate students

  • Clare Salmond
  • Alistair Woodward (University of Auckland)
  • Cindy Kiro (Commissioner for Children, Formerly School of Social Policy, Albany Campus, Massey University)

  • Peter Davis (Department of Sociology, University of Aucklnad)

  • Neil Pearce (Centre for Public Health Research, Wellington Campus, Massey University)

  • Shilpi Ajwani (Colgate Lecturer, Department of Oral Rehabilitation, School of Dentistry, Dunedin Campus, University of Otago)

Contact Information

For any queries regarding the New Zealand Census-Mortality Study, please email Tony Blakely tony.blakely@otago.ac.nz or June Atkinson june.atkinson@otago.ac.nz, or write to them at:

    Department of Public Health
    Wellington School of Medicine & Health Sciences
    PO Box 7343
    Wellington South
    New Zealand

    Tel 64 4 385 5999 ext 6086
    Fax 64 4 389 5319

     

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This page maintained by Sarah Mckenzie. Last updated 28th November, 2007.
 

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