PEOPLE who live in regional and remote areas of NSW cannot expect to live as long as their big city counterparts.
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Figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics this week indicate that in 2011, the median age at death for someone living in an "inner regional" area such as Dubbo was 81.2.
This compared with 81.6 for "major cities" such as Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong.
The more remote the location, the lower the age of death, according to the Deaths, Australia, 2011 report, which classified an area's remoteness according to the Australian Standard Geographical Classification.
The report showed people living in areas classified as "outer regional", the category that included Wellington or Narromine, had a median age of death of 80.2 years in 2011.
The gap was much greater for people living in a "remote" area of NSW, where the median age at death was 75.3.
Areas classified as "very remote" NSW, the category Wilcannia, for instance, would belong to, had a median age of death of 66.6.
The median age of death for all but one geographical classification in NSW was higher than it was five years ago.
Between 2006 and 2011, the median age of death had increased from 80.4 to 81.6 in major cities, from 79.7 to 81.2 in inner regional areas, from 78.9 to 80.2 in outer regional areas and from 74.9 to 75.3 in remote areas.
For very remote NSW, that figure had dropped from 70.6 to 66.6.
The report also included figures comparing the median age of death of indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians on a state-by-state basis in 2011. For NSW it was 58.5 for male Indigenous Australians compared with 79.1 for non-Indigenous male Australians, and 66.2 for female Indigenous Australians compared with 84.7 for female non-Indigenous Australians.
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