Promoting Healthy Ageing in Scotland

Author: Dr Erin Brown, Dr Joy Edwards-Hicks

PDF Published: Monday 26 Jan 2026 (SB 26-07)

The image shows a stacked area chart depicting projected spending, adjusted for inflation, from 2029-30 to 2069-70.The x-axis represents the years, with data points for 2029-30, 2049-50, and 2069-70.The y-axis represents the spending amounts, ranging from £0 to £160 billion.The chart is divided into two categories: Health and social care spending (purple) shows an increase over time, starting at a lower value and gradually rising as the years progress, reaching nearly £80 billion by 2069-70.Other spending (teal) starts at a higher value than health and social care spending in 2029-30 and grows to the highest amount, surpassing £100 billion by 2069-70.The two categories combine to form the total projected spending, which rises over the 40-year period.

Image: Health and social care spending will grow as a share of the budget

The image shows a bar chart illustrating healthcare costs per person by age group. The y-axis represents healthcare costs, ranging from £0 to £20,000.The x-axis represents age groups, starting from 0-1 years and continuing to 90+ years.The chart shows that healthcare costs are lowest for children in the 0-1 years group, around £5,000. As age increases, healthcare costs gradually rise, with a noticeable increase as individuals approach older age groups. By the 90+ years group, healthcare costs are the highest, reaching nearly £20,000.

Image: Health spending is higher for older age groups

The image shows a line graph illustrating the projected spending per age under two scenarios: one where the population is aging less healthily and one where the population is aging more healthily.The x-axis represents age, with the range extending to older ages on the right.The y-axis represents spending per age, with increasing values as you move upwards.There are three lines in the graph:The black line shows the general trend of spending per age, steadily increasing as people get older.The teal dashed line represents the scenario of population aging less healthily, where spending per age rises more sharply as age increases.The purple dashed line represents the scenario of population aging more healthily, where spending per age increases more gradually.The arrows indicate:Population aging less healthily (teal arrow pointing up) leads to higher spending as people age.Population aging more healthily (purple arrow pointing down) results in lower spending over time.

Image: Changes to healthy ageing can change the amount of spending needed per age

Infographic explaining how ageing works and what affects its speed. The left panel compares physiological ageing to chronological ageing, shown as a diagonal line indicating that physical ageing does not always match time passing. The middle panel shows factors that speed up ageing, including poor diet and lack of exercise, represented by a steeper upward curve. The right panel shows factors that slow ageing, including a healthy diet and regular exercise, represented by a gentler upward curve. Human silhouettes at different life stages illustrate changes over time.

Image: Biological versus Chronological Ageing

Circular infographic illustrating the hallmarks of ageing, grouped into three categories: primary, antagonistic, and integrative. In the center, silhouettes show the human life course from infancy to old age. The outer ring lists biological processes associated with ageing. Primary hallmarks include genomic instability, telomere attrition, epigenetic alterations, loss of proteostasis, and disabled macroautophagy. Antagonistic hallmarks include deregulated nutrient sensing, mitochondrial dysfunction, and cellular senescence. Integrative hallmarks include stem cell exhaustion, altered intercellular communication, chronic inflammation, and dysbiosis. Each hallmark is represented by a simple scientific icon.

Image: 12 Hallmarks of Ageing

The image contains two sets of bar graphs comparing life expectancy and healthy life expectancy across the UK regions (England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland) for both females and males.Life expectancy at birth (2022-2024): Females: England - 83.3, UK - 83.0, Northern Ireland - 82.6, Wales - 82.1, Scotland - 81.1Males: England - 73.4, UK - 79.1, Northern Ireland - 78.8, Wales - 78.3, Scotland - 77.1Healthy life expectancy at birth (2021-2023):Females: England - 61.9, Scotland - 60.0, Wales - 59.6Males: England - 61.5, Wales - 60.3, Scotland - 59.6The bar graphs display each region's life expectancy and healthy life expectancy, with higher values represented by longer bars. Female life expectancy is consistently higher than male life expectancy across all regions, and healthy life expectancy is notably lower than total life expectancy in all cases.

Image: Life Expectancy and Healthy Life Expectancy at birth across the UK

The image displays two sets of line graphs comparing life expectancy trends for females and males across Scotland, the UK, Western European countries, and Eastern European countries from 1981 to 2021.Females:The graph shows life expectancy over time, with the lines representing different regions. The line for Scotland is consistently lower than those of the UK and Western European countries.Western European countries exhibit the highest life expectancy, with steady growth.The UK line is positioned above Scotland but below the Western European countries.Eastern European countries show the lowest life expectancy, with a slower increase over time compared to other regions.Males:Similar trends are seen in the male graph. Western European countries have the highest life expectancy, which has grown steadily.Scotland again has a lower life expectancy than the UK, with both lines gradually increasing.The line for Eastern European countries is the lowest, showing the slowest increase in life expectancy over time.The x-axis represents the years from 1981 to 2021, while the y-axis represents age, with the range extending up to 90 years.

Image: Life Expectancy at birth across European Countries, the UK, and Scotland.

The image displays a dot plot comparing life expectancy for males and females across various regions in Scotland. Each row represents a specific region, with blue dots representing males and orange dots representing females.Regions with higher life expectancy include areas like East Renfrewshire, East Dunbartonshire, Shetland Islands, where both males and females have life expectancy values closer to 80-85 years.Regions with lower life expectancy include areas such as Glasgow City, North Lanarkshire, South Lanarkshire, where males in particular have life expectancy values closer to 70-73 years, and females have slightly higher life expectancy, but still lower than in other regions.In general, females have a higher life expectancy than males across all regions, with orange dots (females) positioned further to the right of the blue dots (males) in most cases.The x-axis represents life expectancy values, ranging from 70 to 85 years.

Image: Life expectancy at birth in local authority ordered by female life expectancy - 2022-2024.

The image displays a dot plot comparing healthy life expectancy for males and females across various regions in Scotland. Each row represents a specific region, with blue squares indicating males and orange triangles representing females.Regions with higher healthy life expectancy include those like Orkney Islands, Shetland Islands, East Dunbartonshire, where both males and females have values closer to 70 years.Regions with lower healthy life expectancy include areas such as North Ayrshire, North Lanarkshire, Glasgow City, where males in particular have values closer to 50-55 years. Females also have lower healthy life expectancy in these areas, but the values are still higher than those for males.Females generally have a higher healthy life expectancy than males across all regions, as indicated by the orange triangles (females) being positioned to the right of the blue squares (males) in nearly every region.The x-axis represents healthy life expectancy values, ranging from 45 to 75 years.

Image: Healthy life expectancy at birth in local authority ordered by female healthy life expectancy - 2021-2023

The image presents two line graphs comparing life expectancy and healthy life expectancy over time (2013-15 to 2021-23) for females and males.Female Graph:The life expectancy line (blue) shows a stable trend over the years, with a slight decrease towards 2021-23. The healthy life expectancy line (orange) decreases steadily over the years.The difference between life expectancy and healthy life expectancy is 18.1 years in 2013-15 and increases to 20.8 years in 2021-23.Male Graph:The life expectancy line (blue) also shows stability with a small decrease towards 2021-23. The healthy life expectancy line (orange) declines over time.The difference between life expectancy and healthy life expectancy is 15.2 years in 2013-15 and rises to 17.2 years in 2021-23.Both graphs show a marked gap between life expectancy and healthy life expectancy, with the gap being larger for females than males.The x-axis represents time from 2013-15 to 2021-23, and the y-axis shows age, ranging from 55 to 85 years.

Image: Gender Differences in Life Expectancy and Healthy Life Expectancy

The image presents a dot plot comparing life expectancy for males and females across different levels of deprivation in Scotland, based on the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD).The x-axis represents life expectancy, ranging from 60 to 90 years.The y-axis represents deprivation categories, with 1 being the most deprived and 5 being the least deprived.Most deprived (SIMD 1): The life expectancy for males is the lowest, at around 70 years, while females have a slightly higher life expectancy at about 75 years.Less deprived (SIMD 2-4): As deprivation decreases, life expectancy for both males and females increases, reaching around 75-80 years.Least deprived (SIMD 5): The highest life expectancy is observed in the least deprived areas, with males reaching approximately 80 years and females reaching around 85 years.In general, females have higher life expectancy than males across all deprivation categories. The gap between males and females narrows as the level of deprivation decreases.

Image: Socio-economic Differences in Life Expectancy

The image displays a dot plot comparing healthy life expectancy for males and females across different levels of deprivation in Scotland, based on the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD).The x-axis represents healthy life expectancy, ranging from 45 to 75 years.The y-axis represents deprivation categories, with 1 being the most deprived and 5 being the least deprived.Most deprived (SIMD 1): The healthy life expectancy for males is the lowest, around 50 years, while females have slightly higher healthy life expectancy at about 55 years.Less deprived (SIMD 2-4): As deprivation decreases, healthy life expectancy for both males and females increases, reaching values around 60-65 years.Least deprived (SIMD 5): The highest healthy life expectancy is observed in the least deprived areas, with males at around 70 years and females at about 75 years.In general, females have higher healthy life expectancy than males across all deprivation categories. The gap between males and females narrows as the level of deprivation decreases.

Image: Socio-economic Differences in Healthy Life Expectancy

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