Unequal cuts

The Fawcett Society has pointed out that the coalition Government’s cuts in the UK have disproportionately affected women. So, as well as this policy being a significant backward step in terms of developing public services, we can now see it as a backward step in terms of gender equality. Visit the Fawcett Society website to find out about their campaigns for gender equality: www.fawcettsociety.org.uk.

Recording ethnicity on death certificates

Scotland has become the first country in the UK to record ethnicity on death certificates. So, what difference might that make? Well, in the longer term, it means that information will be available about health conditions, causes of death and so on in relation to different ethnic groups. This can be a very useful dataset when it comes to identifying inequalities in health, and it is to be hoped that this approach will be adopted more widely in due course.