Federal Institute for Population Research

New Article in “European Journal of Population” • 02.10.201828 Years after Reunification: East-West Differences in Mortality Still Exist among Men

A recent article by Michael Mühlichen (BiB) published in the European Journal of Population shows that there are still regional mortality differences in Germany disadvantaging the eastern and northern ‘Länder’.

His analysis focuses on the long-term development of avoidable mortality in the urban and rural areas of two Länder in the north of Germany: Schleswig-Holstein (SH), which belonged politically to the ‘West’, and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern (MV), which belonged to the ‘East’.

Based on official cause-of-death statistics and using methods of decomposition and standardisation, he shows that the east-west differences in northern Germany relate primarily to men and the rural areas. Whereas the mortality levels in the urban areas of MV and SH have converged, the rural areas of MV still show higher levels of preventable and amenable mortality.

He concludes that German health policies should focus more on the accessibility of medical care in the thinly populated areas of Eastern Germany and men-specific measures of primary prevention in particular. This involves also educational policies to reduce the educational disadvantage of men since the level of education influences not only the occupational status later in life but also the health-related lifestyle. Moreover, the creation of adequate opportunities in the labour market, especially for the highly-educated young people, is one of the major current and future challenges in the East.

Michael Mühlichen (2018): Avoidable Mortality in the German Baltic Sea Region Since Reunification: Convergence or Persistent Disparities? In: European Journal of Population (online).

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