STATISTICS
- Death rates from cancer are almost two-thirds higher in Aboriginal than non-Aboriginal populations in remote and urban NSW communities
Research by the cancer council of NSW and the University of NSW suggest cancer rates across the state are 62% higher for Aboriginal people
Indigenous infant and child health is significantly poorer than that of non-Indigenous infants and children - Babies of Indigenous mothers are nearly twice as likely as babies of non-Indigenous mothers to be of low birth weight, a factor affecting health in childhood
- From 1999 – 2004, around twice as many Indigenous infants died before their first birthday as non-Indigenous infants. In the Northern Territory the Indigenous infant mortality rate was 3-4 times the national rate in 2004
- Endocrine, nutritional and metabolic diseases (including diabetes) are 10.1 times the rate of non-Indigenous women and 7.3 times the rate of non-Indigenous men (2003-2004) Based on data from hospital admissions and the National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System
- As at December 2005 the highest age standardised ratio of imprisonment for Indigenous persons was recorded in Western Australia and South Australia with Indigenous people being 19 and 13 times more likely than non-Indigenous people to be in prison
- Indigenous women are the fastest growing prison population