Religious Denomination a Health Factor
Feb 2 2008 10:21
Feb 2 2008 12:20
#2
So, puritan fundamentalist protestants who don't drink or smoke are less likely to die of alcohol & smoking-related illnesses. Who'd have thought? 
It's weird they don't mention the actually authors, what department in Queens, or the name of the study. I'll have a hunt in that journal though.
Feb 2 2008 12:24
#3
They should have split taigs into "actual religious taigs", like my granda who was a pioneer (didn't drink or smoke) all his life, and Mass usher, and died at the ripe old age of 84, and "cultural/comfort taigs" like my granny who smoked like a chimney, didn't volunteer at the church, and died of cancer at 70
Feb 2 2008 12:36
#4
At the end of the day, we all know who's to blame
The Brits
Our study shows that before the occupation of Ireland by the Brits, Catholics lived to the healthy age of 120 on average, with some living much longer. Our study indicates an important interaction effect between "religious category" and "pre/post Brits status".
Under the current British occupation, our study show that prods now live to on average 120 yrs of age, whereas Catholics die at around 40 yrs of age.
Feb 2 2008 13:28
#5
Interesting study . Thanks for the link.
While it is obvious from most studies and even anecdotetal evidence that class has a link to health in every society and this would be broadly uncontested ground, it is less agreed that ethnicity, race or religion has such a bearing.
I would say that it is unlikely that anyone would contested a study that found blacks and hispanics in the US suffer from worse health or similarly blacks in South Africa, arabs in Israel, travellers in all of Ireland etc. The problem arises here I would say because it is contested by many people whether "catholics" suffered oppression or discrimination currently, or indeed historically, in northern Ireland. For my part I would accept that historically in is definitely true that there was severe discrimination against the "catholic community" in the north. I would be inclined to think that as a response to the civil rights movement and the war, the state actively sought to combat that discrimination over time, thus we can see now that employment statistics reflect this work. I suspect that over time health stats will also reflect this. This is not to disregard the fact that the protestant working class was/is oppressed too.
The fact is though that class is the primary factor in relation to general health stats. A study of rich protestants or catholics would give little variation I would suspect, as would one of working class people. I suspect that this health survey reflects a residue of the old oppressive discriminatory regime in northern Ireland.
There are of course cultural factors in terms of diet, exercise etc. that affect health but these are less prominent here than elsewhere I suspect.
Therefore I am at a loss as to the purpose of the comments that followed the initial link?
Feb 2 2008 13:35
#6
sense of humour failure.
Feb 2 2008 13:37
#7
the study is more likely to reflect the fact catholics aren't as likely to be dull as dishwater stoney faced calvinists.
Feb 2 2008 13:45
#8
Jesus christ Janeymac - did you read my first response? My second one was flippant sure, but the first is on point.
The fact that fundamentalist protestants who adhere to non-drinking, non-smoking lifestyles are less likely to die from drink and smoking-related illnesses suggests that the findings are linked to the cultural/lifestyle effects of that denominations tenets (i.e. as a denomination they adhere to a stricter lifestyle), rather than and structural prejudice against catholics, or those Church of Ireland diet-catholics.
Feb 2 2008 15:38
#9
Excellent graph Conor. When it's time to delegate a coordinator class after the revolution, be expecting a nomination.
Feb 2 2008 16:17
#10
xConorx wrote:
The fact that fundamentalist protestants who adhere to non-drinking, non-smoking lifestyles are less likely to die from drink and smoking-related illnesses suggests that the findings are linked to the cultural/lifestyle effects of that denominations tenets (i.e. as a denomination they adhere to a stricter lifestyle), rather than and structural prejudice against catholics, or those Church of Ireland diet-catholics.
Yeah but if you bothered to read the article linked to rather than rushing in to imply Bobby was a crazed sectarian (the second time you did this in 24 hrs and the third time since he left Organise! - do I detect a pattern) - you'd have read ..
Quote:
They found that, overall, Catholics had higher death rates - with the study showing a clear link between this and deprivation.Church of Ireland people had the highest risk of dying from heart disease, researchers said.
The research, published in the journal Social Science & Medicine, said fundamentalists lived longest and had the lowest risk of dying from lung cancer or alcohol related diseases.
So unless the methodology was very sloppy indeed it seems from the summary provided by the article they must have taken life style related effects into account when coming up with the 'clear link between this and deprivation'.
With catholic unemployment being twice the level of protestant unemployment the deprivation link seems to be the most obvious one and would repeat a pattern found all over the world with other divided populations. There is an interesting but rather old article on the possible reasons for the employment gap at http://www.ccruni.gov.uk/research/csc/mm29.htm
I await the standard denunciation for daring to look up such facts rather than relying on the preferred 'my ma lived to 115 and she's catholic' methodology.
Feb 2 2008 18:38
#11
I'll get back a bit more on the actual study a bit later. But as for the accusation that my responses to Bobby relate to hisresignation from Organise I'd hope you'd wind you neck in. You'll notice that Bobby's libcom presence has increased significantly recently and the first of his posts in his recent burst were the bullshit about teachers and parking attendents, which I responded to in a similar matter - and were both before Bobby resigned. If I didn't respond to Bobby with "sectarian" jibes online before, it's because he posts fuck all, please be assured it has been said in person.
So yeah, you're wrong on that.
Feb 3 2008 12:04
#12
JoeBlack2 wrote:
xConorx wrote:
The fact that fundamentalist protestants who adhere to non-drinking, non-smoking lifestyles are less likely to die from drink and smoking-related illnesses suggests that the findings are linked to the cultural/lifestyle effects of that denominations tenets (i.e. as a denomination they adhere to a stricter lifestyle), rather than and structural prejudice against catholics, or those Church of Ireland diet-catholics.Yeah but if you bothered to read the article linked to rather than rushing in to imply Bobby was a crazed sectarian (the second time you did this in 24 hrs and the third time since he left Organise! - do I detect a pattern) - you'd have read ..
Quote:
They found that, overall, Catholics had higher death rates - with the study showing a clear link between this and deprivation.Church of Ireland people had the highest risk of dying from heart disease, researchers said.
The research, published in the journal Social Science & Medicine, said fundamentalists lived longest and had the lowest risk of dying from lung cancer or alcohol related diseases.
So unless the methodology was very sloppy indeed it seems from the summary provided by the article they must have taken life style related effects into account when coming up with the 'clear link between this and deprivation'.
With catholic unemployment being twice the level of protestant unemployment the deprivation link seems to be the most obvious one and would repeat a pattern found all over the world with other divided populations. There is an interesting but rather old article on the possible reasons for the employment gap at http://www.ccruni.gov.uk/research/csc/mm29.htm
I await the standard denunciation for daring to look up such facts rather than relying on the preferred 'my ma lived to 115 and she's catholic' methodology.
Thanks for the link to the lfs survey. Of the various measures of unequal labour force participation you have chosen the starkest though (possibly apart from the figures on female labour force participation). Of course Joe when you say twice the unemployment rate the impact on those many who will not follow the link is much more dramatic and stark than if you were to mention in your post that these are differents between 3% and 6%, that unemployment is at historically low levels, varies according to class location and geographic location etc, etc.
Yes overall these statisitcs show a higher death rate for Catholics linked to deprivation and undoubtedly that has been impacted upon by housing conditions and historically higher rates of unemployment linked to discrimination. In reality the report lacks any notion of a class analysis and I'm pretty certain that if the survey was carried out that was cognisant of class that there would be markedly different conclusions (making allowances for our non-drinking non-smoking Calvinist fundamentalists of course ).
The trouble with all of these types of research though is that they are ethno/religious driven, this has been much more the case since the creation of Section 75 requirements and the GFA's consociationalism. These studies are class blind and as such tell us very little about what working class people in the 'wee north' have in common, rather they'd amalgamate diverse and unreconcilable lived experiences in surveys that are catgegorised under headings of 'catholic', 'protestant', 'church of ireland', 'chinese', 'polish' and on and on ad infinitum.
I'll go have a look at the article you linked to now.
Feb 3 2008 12:22
#13
If catholics insist on being majorities out in shitholes west of the Bann they can hardly expect the jobs to come to them.
Feb 3 2008 12:29
#14
Like Boul said, it's all about how questions are framed, groups defined. I mean dividing stuff on religion masks far more than it iluminates, afterall I bet they'd be more significant difference if the lines were drawn between west of the Bann and east of the Bann rather than religious denominations. Infact the poor health of Church of Ireland might rest on the fact that they have higher percentages outside the main industrial and infastructures areas of East Antrim and North Down which are dominated by Presbyterianism.
Feb 3 2008 18:37
#15
JoeBlack2 wrote:
So unless the methodology was very sloppy indeed it seems from the summary provided by the article they must have taken life style related effects into account when coming up with the 'clear link between this and deprivation'.
You do realise much social research, even at an professional academic level is actually terribly sloppy? I know this because I do it for a wage, and I've passed off some horrendously shit statistics at postgrad level. But giving them benefit of doubt, there's still no reason to believe they surveyed people's drinking/smoking habits, as they probably would have mentioned that, given they looked at smoking/drinking-related illnesses.
Quote:
With catholic unemployment being twice the level of protestant unemployment the deprivation link seems to be the most obvious one and would repeat a pattern found all over the world with other divided populations. There is an interesting but rather old article on the possible reasons for the employment gap at http://www.ccruni.gov.uk/research/csc/mm29.htm
From your own link mate
"Protestants (76%) continue to have higher economic activity rates compared to Roman Catholics (67%). However, in terms of absolute numbers, the numbers of economically active Roman Catholics has increased by 51,000 between 1992 and 2005 compared to an increase of 7,000 for Protestants."
That's a gap that's fast closing and close to irrelevant.
Quote:
I await the standard denunciation for daring to look up such facts rather than relying on the preferred 'my ma lived to 115 and she's catholic' methodology.
Well that's clearly rediculous given that the example I gave was of my granny who died at 70 of lung cancer because, surprise surprise, she smoked all her life. Whereas my granda died 84, and was a pioneer all his life, but whatever.
Feb 3 2008 19:04
#16
"The unemployment rates for Protestants (3%) in 2004 remained lower than that for Roman Catholics (6%), however unemployment rates have decreased significantly for both Roman Catholics and Protestants over the period 1992 – 2005 with the percentage point fall greatest for Roman Catholics."
Also note the observation that one of the common reasons for catholic work-inactivity is student status - with catholics being in the majority at Queens Univ, and at some of the UU campuses. This in no way explains it all but paints a picture that isn't as straightforward as the BBC news article.
- significantly closing gap in the disparity between catholic/protestant employment
- closing gap in the disparity between catholic/protestant unemployment levels
- more catholics in university education in NI despite them being in the technical minority in the population as a whole. There's prods leaving the north because Queens is a taig uni I pick Queens because it offers much of the higher status professional qualifications (law, medicine, dentistry, etc that can't be done at UU). I do relise the Coleraine and JTown campuses have a prod majority. I know our head of dept. Tony Gallagher has done much work on the protestant brain-drain in NI.
PS - you do know I'm a taig right? I guess I'm an uncle-tom.
Feb 3 2008 19:19
#17
yeah working class prods have the lowest uptake of third level education in the UK, even lower than inner city black youth.
Feb 3 2008 20:08
#18
Feb 3 2008 20:18
#19
It said there was a reduced accidental death risk for Methodists and 'other Christians' than the other denominations.
So taigs and less-mental prods have more accidents. Anyone any crackpot theories as to why that might be? I'll buy the best one a soda-pop at the Dublin bookfair.
Feb 3 2008 23:49
#20
xConorx wrote:
PS - you do know I'm a taig right? .
Why is this relevant?
Feb 3 2008 23:59
#21
Two reasons
a- I'm taking the piss
b- my experience as a working-class Belfast catholic might have some bearing on my opinions - I'm declaring my cards is all
Feb 4 2008 07:10
#22
JoeBlack2 wrote:
xConorx wrote:
PS - you do know I'm a taig right? .
Why is this relevant?
Great way not to deal with any info that is relevant isn't it Joe? No. Ah well.
Feb 4 2008 12:14
#23
I don't see any need to 'deal with' the various discussions of context posted, all the more so as a lot of them are also discussed in the articles I linked to anyway.
Feb 4 2008 12:18
#24
the one time I actually have a post with content and it gets ignored 
Feb 4 2008 12:44
#25
The article was published in Social Science and Health and is listed here: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=PublicationURL&_tockey=%23TOC%235925%239999%23999999999%2399999%23FLA%23&_cdi=5925&_pubType=J&_auth=y&_acct=C000007920&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=103681&md5=9b2aa03236cd5c98e2cc2b5bbb7d7ecd
It is, however, unfortunately behind a pay wall. If anybody wants to see the actual content, I can send it to them as I have access to most journals from work. It's a bit silly to criticise a study's methods and focus without even looking at it. In particular, the thing that jumps straight out of you about it is that it is entitled "Religious affiliation and mortality in Northern Ireland: Beyond Catholic and Protestant" - the paper is arguing that there are significant health differences related to specific religious denomination and its whole thrust is that apparently subtle religious differences can have a large impact upon health outcomes.
It specifically finds that there is no correlation between catholic 'lifestyle' and worse health outcomes, the differences are purely down to higher levels of deprivation among catholics: "Catholics had higher mortality than non-Catholics, though this disappeared after adjustment for socio-economic status." The significant finding of the paper, from the authors' point of view, was that there was a difference in outcomes between other denominations which remained after adjustment for socio-economic status.
Quote:
You do realise much social research, even at an professional academic level is actually terribly sloppy? I know this because I do it for a wage, and I've passed off some horrendously shit statistics at postgrad level. But giving them benefit of doubt, there's still no reason to believe they surveyed people's drinking/smoking habits, as they probably would have mentioned that, given they looked at smoking/drinking-related illnesses.
In this case it's a pretty respectable peer-reviewed journal - one that's generally in the field of epidemiology which is an area where people use pretty well-established and mathematically rigorous methodologies for identifying statistical correlations.
Feb 4 2008 13:51
#26
Where did I actually challenge its methodology? I challenged the assertion that a rigourous methodology free of criticism should be assumed.
I have full-text access so I'll have a wee look now.
From the abstract:
Catholics had higher mortality than non-Catholics, though this disappeared after adjustment for socio-economic status.
So it's not religion but class that's affecting mortality, fair enough. So your point will be that catholics suffer from deprivation more than prods.
The data they point to in this respect is typicaly employment levels but is up to 2001, whereas ongoing studies such as the one JoeBlack posted indicate that up to 2005 there had been a dramatic reduction in the disparity between catholic and protestant employment and unemployment levels.
From that other study - unemployment rates have decreased significantly for both Roman Catholics and Protestants over the period 1992 – 2005 with the percentage point fall greatest for Roman Catholics....The differential unemployment gap between the respective unemployment rates has fallen from 9% in 1992 to 4% in 2005.
And there's no reason to presume this trend will not continue unless someone has 2007 data to the contrary.
Again, from JoeBlack's link - Protestants (76%) continue to have higher economic activity rates compared to Roman Catholics (67%). However, in terms of absolute numbers, the numbers of economically active Roman Catholics has increased by 51,000 between 1992 and 2005 compared to an increase of 7,000 for Protestants.
I'll try and summarise my reading of it.
Catholics have higher mortality than prods.
When you factor in socioeconomic factors, that difference disappears.
Catholics "suffer from deprivation" more than prods
with there being 4% difference in unemployment in favour of prods - this has steadily fallen since 1992 from 9% to 4% in 2005
and a 9% difference in employment level in favour of prods - but "the numbers of economically active Roman Catholics has increased by 51,000 between 1992 and 2005 compared to an increase of 7,000 for Protestants."
Church of Ireland members had the highest overall mortality in the fully adjusted models, due to their higher risk of cardiovascular disease.
‘Other Christians’ had lowest all-cause mortality and particularly low mortality from alcohol-related deaths and lung cancer.
These findings point to an association between religious affiliation, behaviour and lifestyle suggesting that, even in relatively secular societies, it is a population attribute that should be given more consideration in studies of population health.
It's misleading to conclude it has anything to do with religion beyond class, behaviour and lifestyle factors, although I assume you wouldn't do that.
Feb 4 2008 14:18
#27
The following responses contain implicit criticisms of the study. The criticisms are all misleading.
xConorx wrote:
So, puritan fundamentalist protestants who don't drink or smoke are less likely to die of alcohol & smoking-related illnesses. Who'd have thought? ;)
revol68 wrote:
the study is more likely to reflect the fact catholics aren't as likely to be dull as dishwater stoney faced calvinists.
xConorx wrote:
The fact that fundamentalist protestants who adhere to non-drinking, non-smoking lifestyles are less likely to die from drink and smoking-related illnesses suggests that the findings are linked to the cultural/lifestyle effects of that denominations tenets (i.e. as a denomination they adhere to a stricter lifestyle), rather than and structural prejudice against catholics, or those Church of Ireland diet-catholics.
Boulcolonialboy wrote:
In reality the report lacks any notion of a class analysis and I'm pretty certain that if the survey was carried out that was cognisant of class that there would be markedly different conclusions (making allowances for our non-drinking non-smoking Calvinist fundamentalists of course wink).
The following is also incorrect:
xConorx wrote:
So your point will be that catholics suffer from deprivation more than prods. The data they point to in this respect is typicaly employment levels but is up to 2001,
In this particular study they use four indicators of social status and adjust for them:
study wrote:
Four measures indicating socio-economic status were included: housing tenure (owner, private renting, and social renting); car availability (two or more cars, one only, and no access); the National Statistics Socio-economic Classification (comprising eight categories from professional to routine occupation classes, see Table 1) (Rose & Pevalin, 2002); and education (ranked: university level/equivalent; ‘A-level’/equivalent; ‘O-level’/equivalent; and no qualifications).
Also, the following is incorrect:
xConorx wrote:
whereas ongoing studies such as the one JoeBlack posted indicate that up to 2005 there had been a dramatic reduction in the disparity between catholic and protestant employment and unemployment levels.
You haven't introduced any figures that show how the disparity between catholic and protestant employment levels have changed. You have referred to statistics which show 'economic activity' at 67 and 76% respectively, you have further referend to absolute numbers which show that "the numbers of economically active Roman Catholics has increased by 51,000 between 1992 and 2005 compared to an increase of 7,000 for Protestants" in order to even start to analyse the disparity, you would need to work out the percentage changes - given population growth, it could turn out that 51,000 represents a decline in percentages and a widening of the gap (I don't know, I haven't worked it out, I'm just pointing out that your conclusions on the evidence that you have put forward is statistically misleading).
[incidentally, levels of economic activity are a better measure of real unemployment than unemployment figures as the last decade has seen a huge number of people moved from unemployment to incapacity benefits.]
Feb 4 2008 14:29
#28
Sorry pretty much all you've written there is
"you're wrong here, here, here, and here"
But not actually said ANYTHING at all.
Actually na Gurrier you're spot on - us catholics have it fierce rough up here 
If only someone could stop this discrimination against me and my people.
Feb 4 2008 14:37
#29
xConorx wrote:
whereas ongoing studies such as the one JoeBlack posted indicate that up to 2005 there had been a dramatic reduction in the disparity between catholic and protestant employment and unemployment levels.
I just had a wee look and found the actual 2007 labour force report and it turns out that your conclusion above is quite wrong and that the difference in employment rates has been stubbornly persistent between 1992 and 2005
labour force study wrote:
In 1992, 77% of Protestants were economically active as were 66% of Roman Catholics. In 2005 comparable figures were 76% of Protestants and 67% of Roman Catholics economically active.
If you look at the graph in figure 3.3, you can see that the gap has been surprisingly persistent and very steady.
Feb 4 2008 14:45
#30
And while you point correctly the use of absolute numbers needs qualification but i don't think catholic breeding is outstripping that of prods by a factor of 6 mate
Actually just had a wee look and your suggestion (and I know it was just a suggestion) that taigs breeding more might minimise the % effects of increased employment in absolute terms isn't really supported by evidence. Results based on the 2001 census show that by 1991, taig fertility was only 31% higher than prods (oh, that's 17yrs ago - so they're of working age now) i.e. not outstripping it by a factor of 6, and that by 2001, catholic fertility had shown a sharper drop than prod fertility (but still remained higher)
(((catholics)))