Covid-19: England’s health declined in 2020, but not across all areas

The health of the population in England declined in 2020 during the early stages of the pandemic, although there was a mixed picture across different areas of health, official data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show.1The Health Index for England declined from 100.5 in 2019 to 100.1 in 2020, driven largely by falls on indicators relating to personal wellbeing and mortality. But the data also show improvements in some areas that were likely to have been affected by pandemic preventative measures.Emma Rourke, interim deputy national statistician (health, population, and methods) at the ONS, explained, “We can see that there was an improvement in the Healthy Places domain in part because of factors such as better air quality, fewer road accidents, and less crime impact. This was likely driven by the need for people to stay at home at this time. However, the score for the Healthy People category…
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