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Although higher education has been associated with lower mortality rates in many studies, the effect of potential improvements in educational distribution on future mortality levels is unknown. We therefore estimated the impact of projected increases in higher education on mortality in European populations. We used mortality and population data according to educational level from 21 European populations and developed counterfactual scenarios. The first scenario represented the improvement in the future distribution of educational attainment as expected on the basis of an assumption of cohort replacement. We estimated the effect of this counterfactual scenario on mortality with a 10-15-year time horizon among men and women aged 30-79 years using a specially developed tool based on population attributable fractions (PAF). We compared this with a second, upward levelling scenario in which everyone has obtained tertiary education. The reduction of mortality in the cohort replacement scenario ranged from 1.9 to 10.1% for men and from 1.7 to 9.0% for women. The reduction of mortality in the upward levelling scenario ranged from 22.0 to 57.0% for men and from 9.6 to 50.0% for women. The cohort replacement scenario was estimated to achieve only part (4-25% (men) and 10-31% (women)) of the potential mortality decrease seen in the upward levelling scenario. We concluded that the effect of on-going improvements in educational attainment on average mortality in the population differs across Europe, and can be substantial. Further investments in education may have important positive side-effects on population health.

Background: Over the past decade, accelerometers have increased in popularity as an objective measure of physical activity in free-living individuals. Evidence suggests that objective measures, rather than subjective tools such as questionnaires, are more likely to detect associations between physical activity and health in children. To date, a number of studies of children and adolescents across diverse cultures around the globe have collected accelerometer measures of physical activity accompanied by a broad range of predictor variables and associated health outcomes. The International Children's Accelerometry Database (ICAD) project pooled and reduced raw accelerometer data using standardized methods to create comparable outcome variables across studies. Such data pooling has the potential to improve our knowledge regarding the strength of relationships between physical activity and health. This manuscript describes the contributing studies, outlines the standardized methods used to process the accelerometer data and provides the initial questions which will be addressed using this novel data repository. Methods: Between September 2008 and May 2010 46,131 raw Actigraph data files and accompanying anthropometric, demographic and health data collected on children (aged 3-18 years) were obtained from 20 studies worldwide and data was reduced using standardized analytical methods. Results: When using >= 8, >= 10 and >= 12 hrs of wear per day as a criterion, 96%, 93.5% and 86.2% of the males, respectively, and 96.3%, 93.7% and 86% of the females, respectively, had at least one valid day of data. Conclusions: Pooling raw accelerometer data and accompanying phenotypic data from a number of studies has the potential to: a) increase statistical power due to a large sample size, b) create a more heterogeneous and potentially more representative sample, c) standardize and optimize the analytical methods used in the generation of outcome variables, and d) provide a

We identified policies that may be effective in reducing smoking among socioeconomically disadvantaged groups, and examined trends in their level of application between 1985 and 2000 in six western-European countries (Sweden, Finland, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany, and Spain). We located studies from literature searches in major databases, and acquired policy data from international data banks and questionnaires distributed to tobacco policy organisations/researchers. Advertising bans, smoking bans in workplaces, removing barriers to smoking cessation therapies, and increasing the cost of cigarettes have the potential to reduce socioeconomic inequalities in smoking. Between 1985 and 2000, tobacco control policies in most countries have become more targeted to decrease the smoking behaviour of low-socioeconomic groups. Despite this, many national tobacco-control strategies in western-European countries still fall short of a comprehensive policy approach to addressing smoking inequalities.

The December 1998 White Paper, Smoking Kills, put forward a wide range of measures on smoking and health. A centralcomponent of the reforms is the provision of new monies to develop smoking cessation services across the country. In thefirst year of implementation, the new resources have been limited to health authorities within Health Action Zones, as partof the government's strategy to target disadvantaged communities where smoking prevalence is particularly high. Alongwith introducing a monitoring system for the new services in HAZs, the Department of Health has commissioned a one yearstudy which aims to look at a range of strategic issues relating to service development. This report presents findings fromthe first five months of this study. Report submitted to the Department of Health, February 2000

The National Evaluation of Health Action Zones began in January 1999, and is being conducted by a team of researchersbased at three universities and led by Professor Ken Judge at the University of Kent. Funding from the Department ofHealth for the evaluation has been confirmed until December 2002. In addition to research activities, there are a number ofco-ordination and development tasks being undertaken by the team, in many cases in co-operation with the HAZ team atthe NHSE. One of the most central of these is linking with local evaluators. The national team has an important role to playin supporting and co-ordinating local evaluation efforts in order to facilitate shared learning. This support andco-ordination function is being achieved in a number of ways: Providing input at local and national HAZ events; including helping to plan and run regional Learning Conferences Maintaining contact with local evaluators and taking a leadership role in developing an evaluation network Supporting local evaluators in their efforts to integrate the Theory of Change approach into their evaluation strategies. Developing a collection of local evaluation documents and materials which can be used as a resource by all HAZs

Health Action Zones (HAZs) are a central part of the new health policy being forged in Britain in the late 1990s. They are part of a family of regeneration initiatives that are central to the government’s policies of tackling social exclusion and modernising public services. In particular, health action zones are expected to be ‘trailblazers’; pioneering innovative approaches to reducing health inequalities, and developing services that are more responsive to patients and users. Twenty-six health action zones have been established in England. They vary in size and complexity but they share many common characteristics. Not least among these is their emphasis on collaboration and partnership between public and private agencies and voluntary and community organisations.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between income levels and the use of long term care servicesafter taking account of disability, health status, availability of informal care and other conventional indicators of the need related circumstances of frail elderly people.