The average life expectancy of a woman in Ireland today is 84, however the average age of death for a single homeless woman in Dublin is just 38.
Social exclusion is extremely bad for your health and it is particularly detrimental if you are a woman.
Next Sunday is International Women’s Day, a day when we celebrate the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call for action for accelerating women’s equality. The theme this year is #EachforEqual and nowhere are women today more unequal than those who silently exist at the very margins of society.
Women who are socially excluded include prisoners, those living in direct provision, Traveller women and the homeless.
A 2018 study from the medical journal the Lancet, found that people who are socially excluded – including the homeless, drug users, sex workers and prisoners – experience extreme health inequities across a range of conditions with the effect of exclusion being greater in women than men. That same paper found that men who are socially excluded were eight times more likely to die at a given age than non-socially excluded men, but for women it was 12 times higher.
Source: June Shannon, Irish Times, 4th March 2020
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