The figures are alarming – people living in low-income neighbourhoods or shantytowns in Argentina live, on average, 11 years less than other citizens.
This statistic emerges from a new study carried out by CISUR (Centro para la Integración Sociourbana), who describe the fact as a “consequence of inequality.”
The survey is based on the demographic information emerging from Argentina’s 2022 National Census, the death registries of the National Health Ministry and the independent studies of the ReNaBap (Registro Nacional de Barrios Populares (ReNaBap) registry for villas, commonly called shantytowns or slum neighbourhoods in English.
CISUR experts identified important differences in the composition of the population and the average life expectancy in the humblest zones compared with the statistics of the country’s general population.
According to the country’s demographic pyramid, corresponding to 2022, most citizens are living longer, with more elderly people and a broader tip of the pyramid, while infants occupy proportionally less space. The striking thing, nevertheless, is that in the poorest neighbourhoods the base of the pyramid changes drastically with a greater presence of infants and youth in comparison with the national average.
This inevitably leads to a revealing figure: the low number of adults and elderly people. Measured in numbers, people aged between 65 and 79 are registered as 9.1 percent of the population nationwide but in humbler zones that percentage barely reaches 2.6 percent.
In more advanced ages, the difference is even wider – in Argentina, 2.64 percent of the population is aged over 80 while in slum neighbourhoods they are barely 0.31 percent 8.5 times less. According to CISUR, the pyramid “is more like the 1914 [National] Census when Buenos Aires grew on the basis of overcrowded conventillo tenements, precarious housing without sewage or running water together with an urban development marked by inequality.”
The CISUR study revealed a stunning figure: while the population in general dies at 71 on average, in the shantytowns life is interrupted 11 years earlier with the average age at death barely 60, which shows the magnitude of the inequality in terms of life expectancy.
The report does not offer a single cause but presents a triangle of factors to explain the gap: precarious housing, limited access to health and a job market marked by informality. That combination erodes the lifespan of those who live in the most deprived sectors, conditioning their present as much as their future.
In a context of ongoing budget austerity, these findings serve as an alarm-bell. With sustained investment, state planning and the guarantee of basic rights, points out CISUR, the gap in life expectancy could be reduced. If the contrary, in low-income neighbourhoods old age will continue being a privilege to which few can have access.
–TIMES/PERFIL
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