Ethnic and class differences in health in relation to British South Asians: using the new National Statistics Socio-Economic Classification

The paper examines the use of the new measure of social class in the UK, th e National Statistics Socio-Economic Classification (NS-SEC) and other soci o-econornic variables in explaining differences in health between British S outh Asians and the majority White population. There are a number of hypoth eses which try to explain ethnic differences in health and yet there have b een relatively few empirical studies which test the explanatory value of th ese hypotheses. Cross sectional data from the fourth National Survey of Eth nic Minorities (1993-1994) with 2860 white, 1268 Indian and 1771 Pakistani and Bangladeshi adult respondents are analysed. The associations of self-ra ted health with ethnicity, social class, local area deprivation and standar d of living are analysed. Pakistani and Bangladeshi respondents have the po orest self-rated health, Followed by Indians. Differences in self-rated hea lth between ethnic groups reduce to non-significance after adjusting for so cial class, local area deprivation and standard of living. There is some ev idence of social class differences in the health of Indians and not much ev idence for Pakistanis and Bangladeshis. The NS-SEC is useful in explaining ethnic differences in health. The poorer health of Indians, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis compared to Whites may be largely understood in terms of facto rs related to occupational social class, material Living conditions and loc al area deprivation. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.