City aboriginals report poor health.

OTTAWA -- Aboriginal people living off reserve are more likely to experience poor health than their non-aboriginal neighbours, Statistics Canada reports.

The first study of its kinds compared the two populations on the basis of self-perceived health, chronic conditions, long-term activity restriction and depression. All data were adjusted for age because the off-reserve Aboriginal population is much younger than the non-aboriginal population.

Using data from the 2000/01 Canadian Community Health Survey, the study found that:

* 23% of Aboriginal people living off-reserve rated their health as either fair or poor compared with 12% for the non-Aboriginal population;

* the gap persisted across all geographic regions and income levels;

* the off-reserve Aboriginal population was 1.5 times more likely than the non-Aboriginal population to report at least one chronic condition such as diabetes, high blood pressure or arthritis;

* the rate was reduced to 1.3 times when health behaviours were taken into account;

* off-reserve Aboriginals in the territories were less likely to report a chronic condition, possibly because they were far less likely to have seen a general practitioner who may have diagnosed the condition in the year prior to the survey--59% compared with 79% of their counterparts in the province;

* the off-reserve Aboriginal population was 1.4 times more likely than the non-Aboriginal population to report a long-term activity restriction--a difference that was eliminated when health behaviours were taken into account;

* about 13% of the off-reserve Aboriginal population had experienced a major depressive episode in the year before the survey, compared with 7% for the non-Aboriginal population.

In the case of depression and chronic conditions, the gap between the off-reserve Aboriginal population and the non-Aboriginal population at the high income level was not significant, the report says.

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