Poor but healthy? The youngest generation of Irish catholics in west Scotland.

OBJECTIVE

Catholic adults in the West of Scotland, who are mainly of Irish origin, have been shown to suffer excess morbidity and mortality compared to the general population. A major contributing factor to this inequality is socio-economic disadvantage. This paper investigates the health and socio-economic position of Catholics in the youngest generation.

DESIGN

Secondary analysis of baseline data from the West of Scotland 11-16 STUDY: Teenage Health, which is a longitudinal school-based survey.

SETTING

One hundred and thirty five primary schools in Glasgow and surrounding districts.

SUBJECTS

Two thousand five hundred and eighty six final-year pupils (average age eleven years and three months), born in 1983/1984.

RESULTS

Comparing Catholics and non-Catholics on a range of indicators of general health, recent acute symptoms, chronic conditions, mental health and physical measures, we found no evidence of any systematic health inequality. A few indicators did show statistically significant differences at the five percent level, but these were not in any consistent direction. In terms of household socio-economic position, though, we found strong evidence of disadvantage for Catholics. Catholic children were more likely to have parents of manual social class, without any formal qualifications, who were less likely to own their home or a car, more likely to express difficulty 'making ends meet', and more likely to live in a deprived area.

CONCLUSIONS

We discuss the prospects for diminishing socio-economic inequality over time between Catholics and non-Catholics in this cohort, which will depend on Catholic social mobility. We consider the likelihood of enduring health equality for Catholics, which will depend on the effects of different influences on health over the life course.