A new ONS report produced in conjunction with PHE has been published revealing the scale of inequalities in life expectancy and healthy life expectancy across England, but also within local authority areas.
The data shows that wide inequalities exist not only between the most and least deprived areas of the country; but between the most and least deprived areas within local councils across the country.
This is the first time such an analysis has been done and it will help health professionals, both nationally and within local authority areas, assess, down to very small geographies, where they need to focus their efforts.
The number of years an individual could expect to live in good health (healthy life expectancy) in 2009 to 2013 in England was 63.5 years for males and 64.8 years for females.
Compared with the most deprived areas, the figures for those living in the least deprived areas were higher by 16.7 years for males and 16.8 years for females. This difference was much greater for healthy life expectancy than it was for life expectancy.
The report also concludes that there has been little change in this inequality over the last decade.
Professor John Newton, chief knowledge officer at Public Health England, said: "The findings reinforce the need to address health inequality through public health and prevention as all the evidence shows that the root causes of health inequalities like these lie largely outside the health service.
"The other big issue is that inequalities are greater for years of life lived in ill health. People are living longer with one or more diseases like diabetes or cancer that might in the past have been fatal. This is a new situation for care services and has implications for how and where the resources those services need to be allocated in future."
