Australian Institute of Health and Welfare releases new report on Aboriginal health and wellbeing
FEBRUARY 20 2019
A new report of the health and welfare of the country’s young Aboriginal population has shown the state’s population has the highest employment rate of all the states.
In the Australian Capital Territory, Aboriginal people aged between 15 to 24 years old had a job followed by 43 per cent of the Tasmanian population.ADVERTISING
Employment was lowest in the Northern Territory at 21 per cent.
The Northern Territory had highest proportion of homeless young people at 24 per cent of the population while Tasmania had the lowest at 1 per cent.
The data was captured in the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s 2018 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adolescent and youth health and wellbeing report, released on Wednesday.
It found nationally more than one in 10 of the nation’s young Aboriginal people had experienced physical violence towards them, be it from a friend, relative, partner or kin.
Tasmania was the third-highest ranking in the category but under 20 per cent of the state’s population.
Twenty per cent of the population reported they had received “unfair treatment” over 12 months.
Tasmania’s Aboriginal population was among the lowest of the states to have experienced psychological distress at 26 per cent.
Despite this, the state’s youth registered the highest rate of all states and terrorities in reporting mental health conditions at 33 per cent of the population.
Anxiety and depression was the most commonly reported long-term mental health condition followed by behaviourial and emotional problems or drug and alcohol dependence.
The proportion of young Aboriginal mothers who smoked during pregnancy was lowest in Tasmania at 36 per cent.
More than 60 per cent of the state’s population had reported the use of illicit substances in the previous 12 months over the reporting period