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Women living in the Brisbane suburb of Murarrie are dying 15 years younger than those in neighbouring Cannon Hill, according to new research mapping health outcomes across the city.
The University of Queensland study used train stations as geographic markers to collect health data and determine average life expectancy.
On the Redcliffe Peninsula line, the median age of death for men living in Zillmere was 72-years-old, 10 years below the median age for those a few kilometres away in Geebung.
On the Cleveland line, women in Murarrie – a former rural outpost turned industrial area – were found to die on average 15 years younger than those in neighbouring Cannon Hill, despite the stations being only 1.6 kilometres apart.
Health geographer and UQ associate professor Jonathan Olsen, who led the study, said there are many social, environmental, economic and cultural factors that affect health outcomes, including lack of access to income, housing, education and employment.
“There’s also the types of services that you have in the local place … [and] access to parks and green spaces,” he said.
South of the CBD, data for Darra and Richlands – stations located around four kilometres apart – revealed one of the starkest differences in health outcomes.
Men in the Inala-Richlands area had a life expectancy of 70 years – 11 years less than men in Darra-Sumner. For women, this was 74 and 86 respectively; a 12-year difference.
Darra and Inala are less than six kilometres apart by car, with both suburbs renowned for their multiculturalism. But a comparison of census data reveals the differences that reinforce UQ’s findings.
Inala has a higher Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population than Darra, with Indigenous Australians facing significant health disparities compared to non-Indigenous Australians. Residents in Inala also earn less on average and have a higher number of single parent households.
Census analysis of Cannon Hill and Murarrie, where women have a 15-year difference in life expectancy, found similar disparities.
While Murarrie had a higher median household income than Cannon Hill, data showed higher rates of divorce, unpaid care and female single parent households – factors that contribute to worse health inequities for women.
The research can help planners decide where to upgrade parks and build bike paths. Similar studies focussing on transport maps have been completed in Glasgow, London and New York.
“We don’t want to say this place has the worst health outcomes in Brisbane,” Olsen said.
“What we want to do is highlight that there’s a variety of health outcomes between places that we can support [and encourage] policymakers and government health officials to think, ‘ok, how do we go in and change these places? What supports do they need?’
“It also allows people to understand that within the inner cities, we have a variety of places and people, and actually, the health outcomes of these people are quite different in quite close proximity.”
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