Skip to content

Health inequalities

Too many people in our communities in Wales are experiencing poor health or living shorter lives because of avoidable and unfair harms to their health. These differences in health outcomes are known as health inequalities. Our Health Inequalities narrative describes what health inequalities are and what causes them. Health inequalities can affect people based on factors such as:

  • Social and economic circumstances (like poverty, education, housing, and jobs)
  • Protected characteristics under the law  (e.g. race, age, sex, disability, religion)
  • People at greater or multiple risk (e.g. asylum seekers, people who are homeless or involved in the justice system)
  • Where they live and spend time (e.g. urban, rural, or coastal areas, and access to local services

Many people belong to more than one of these groups, this is called intersectionality which can make health inequalities even worse.  

Table of contents:

How can we reduce health inequalities?

For good health people need the right building blocks in place like good housing, fair work, nurturing childhoods, and access to healthcare.

Public Health Wales is working to reduce these inequalities by informing, advocating, and mobilising action, and by ensuring our services deliver for all. We want to create a Wales where everyone has a fair chance to live well and live longer in good health.

We have developed an evidence based framework to use during decision making, planning processes to reduce health inequalities.  

Our Solutions for Health Equity page provides further information on data, evidence, health economics and modelling, policies, good practice, innovative tools and practical solutions to help improve population wellbeing and reduce the health equity gap in Wales.

How is Public Health Wales working to reduce health inequalities?

We are addressing health inequalities through our delivering excellent public health services to protect the public and health outcomes services, for example

We are also addressing health inequalities through support to government and partnership to influencing the wider determinants of health.

Several key pieces of legislation in Wales provide strong foundations for our approach to tackling health inequalities:

  • Equality Act 2010: Introduces the Public Sector Equality Duty, requiring public bodies to consider how their decisions affect people with protected characteristics, promoting fairness and equal opportunity.
  • Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015: Mandates public bodies to work towards well-being goals, including a more equal Wales, encouraging long-term, preventative approaches to reducing inequality.
  • Socio-economic Duty (part of the Equality Act 2010, enacted in Wales in 2021): Requires public bodies to consider how their strategic decisions can reduce the inequalities of outcome resulting from socio-economic disadvantage.

Explore the data on health inequalities

Further information

Resources

View all

Reports

View all

Data