'No surprise people living shorter lives'

THE author of a host of major publications exposing health inequalities in the UK and further afield, Professor Sir Michael Marmot is unquestionably one of the world's leading health equity experts.

- ROB PARSONS

And this week he's written to 58 MPs including 13 in the North - after new analysis revealed people in their constituencies are "suffering avoidable ill-health and living shorter lives than they should".

Academics from the Institute of Health Equity at University College London highlight the areas like Rotherham and County Durham are "falling behind" when it comes to health.

And the study shows that the biggest increase in inequality between the least deprived and most deprived neighbourhoods from 2010-12 to the start of the Covid-19 pandemic (when things actually got worse) was in the North East of England.