A nation still divided by poverty and inequality

Key points

• NHS data used to assemble map of Scotland's health

• Radical difference in life expectancy between areas within cities

• Welfare dependency emerging as hallmark of 'Third Scotland'

Key quote

"Scotland's health is improving. However, the Executive recognises differences in life expectancy and mortality rates are significant and widening between our most and least affluent people. We want to strengthen primary care in deprived areas to address these problems." - EXECUTIVE SPOKESPERSON

Story in full TODAY, The Scotsman reveals the true extent of inequality across Scotland, in a devastating study showing the country's wealthiest suburb has a life expectancy of 87.7 years, while a boy born in the poorest area of Glasgow can expect to die at 54.

A child born in Calton, in the East End of Glasgow, is three times as likely to suffer heart disease, four times as likely to be hospitalised and ten times as likely to grow up in a workless household than a child in the city's prosperous western suburbs.

In contrast, Scotland's top neighbourhoods are shown to offer an outstanding quality of life, with high salaries, reasonable house prices and a life expectancy longer than the average for any country in the developed world.

Using NHS data, The Scotsman has compiled an extensive deprivation index, with data for the country's 830 postcode areas, and separated the top and bottom 100 neighbourhoods to show for the first time the scale of inequality in Scotland.

While previous studies have portrayed Glasgow as a national blackspot, with life expectancy the lowest in the UK at 69, The Scotsman study shows that some of the city's suburbs and surrounding areas offer a quality of life found in few other places in the world.

A boy born in Bearsden, Milngavie, Lenzie, Clarkston or Kilmacolm can expect to live to over 80, according to data for 1998-2002. But a journey to the eastern side of Glasgow finds life expectancy plunging by two decades.

Male life expectancy in Dalmarnock, Calton, Kinning Park and Townhead is below 60: Britain, as a country, passed this mark during the Second World War.

The Scotsman has disentangled the data and concentrated on two blocks: "Prime Scotland", which comprises the best 100 neighbourhoods, and "Third Scotland", where life expectancy is closer to the third world.

If Prime Scotland were a country, it world have the longest life expectancy in the world. The top international spots are occupied by Iceland (79.0 years), Japan (78.4 years) Sweden (77.9 years), Australia and Canada (both 77.8 years).

Third Scotland, by contrast, has an average male life expectancy of only 64.4 years - meaning an eighth of the men in the country can expect to die before the official pension age. This life expectancy is lower than in Bosnia, Lebanon, the Gaza Strip, Iran or North Korea.

While poverty is concentrated in the East End of Glasgow, inequality exists across Scotland. The difference in life expectancy between the best and worst postcode areas is 22 years in Edinburgh, 17 years in Paisley, 15 years in Perthshire and nine years in the Highlands.