South Lakeland Health Improvement Plan - NHS Cumbria

IntroductionSouth Lakeland covers an area of 1,551 square kilometres in thesouthern portion of Cumbria. It is the second largest district in the county andhas the largest population. It is a mainly rural district and has the secondsmallest population density in Cumbria.The local authority comprises 4 distinct areas centred on Kendal,Furness and Cartmel and the areas within the Lake District and YorkshireDales National Parks. Urbanised areas of South Lakeland include Kendalwhich is the largest town and administrative centre, as well as the smallertowns of Bowness, Windermere, Ambleside, Ulverston and Sedbergh.The M6 motorway runs through the district in the East providing directaccess to Manchester in less than 1 hour and the Midlands in 2 hours. AFrequent ‘intercity’ rail service connects Oxenholme (Lake District) to LondonEuston and local connections are provided to Windermere and the FurnessPeninsula which links South Lakeland with Lancashire and West Cumbria.The health of people in South Lakeland is generally better than theEngland average. All of the districts 47 wards fall within the three leastdeprived of the 5 national deprivation groups and overall death rates at allages from all causes are lower than the England average for both men andwomen. The district is known as one of the finest areas in the country for itsquality of life.1. PopulationSouth Lakeland covers 23% of the land area of Cumbria and has 21% of thetotal Cumbrian population with 104,900 inhabitants. It has a populationdensity of 0.7 (persons per hectare) which is the second lowest in Cumbriaand significantly lower than the England average of 3.9.Figure 1.1 shows the population structure of South Lakeland. Theproportion of residents over the age of 65 is 22.3%. This is higher than theEngland average of 16% and is the highest proportion for any district inCumbria. The proportion of residents aged 15-44 is 32.7% which is lower thanthe England average of 41.6%. Table 1.1 shows vital statistics concerningbirths and deaths in South Lakeland. The rates shown are crude rates (notstandardised by age: see section 5 for furtherr explanation of rates andstandardisation) and so the high death and low birth rates experienced inSouth Lakeland are explained by the district having a much older populationthan the national average.1.1. Population PredictionsPopulation predictions given in Table 1.2 show an increase inpopulation in South Lakeland of 12% from 2008 levels by 2028 despite thefact that there are more deaths than births each year. This is due to high ratesof predicted population change in the over 65 age group with a predictedSouth Lakeland Baseline Assessment 2009 7