In Amelia Hill’s article (UK state pension age will soon need to rise to 71, say experts, 5 February), Les Mayhew of the International Longevity Centre is quoted as saying: “In the UK, state pension age would need to be 70 or 71 compared with 66 now … But if you bring preventable ill health into the equation, that would have to increase even more.” The significant word there is “preventable” – except no one is taking any notice of it. The article goes on: “By age 70, only 50% of adults in England and Wales are now disability-free and able to work.” Those who cannot are overwhelmingly poor.
The 2020 Marmot report on health inequity tells us that, on average, healthy life expectancy at birth is 12 years longer for those from the least deprived local authorities. I heard Michael Marmot present his first review, in 2010; even then he warned that increasing the pension age would not address the pension problem because of the high rates of disability in older people who had spent their lives in poverty.
