Dr Armstrong: "Equality statement"

Elsewhere in the report it was revealed that Scots are healthier and living longer, although a gap still remained between the health of the well-off and those in more deprived areas.

Dr Armstrong said narrowing that gap must remain "a top priority" for the Scottish Executive, but insisted that Scots were taking on board the attempts to improve the health of the nation.

He said: "Scots are living longer and living better than their predecessors. Targets on reducing cancer, heart disease and smoking have all been met.

"But one of the continued themes of health in Scotland, as across the world, is the damaging effect on health of the gap between rich and poor.

"With depravation, low income and poverty comes a higher burden of disease, poorer uptake of services and worse outcomes of care.

Significant progress

For lung cancer, the incidence rates among people living in the most deprived areas of Scotland are three times higher than the rates in the least deprived areas.

And although the incidence of breast cancer is highest among women from the most well-to-do areas, their chances of survival are significantly better than those from deprived areas.

Dr Armstrong said there had been significant progress in tackling heart disease.

The number of people who died from coronary heart disease in 2000 was 12,412, down from 17,885 in 1980.

But he said people living in the most deprived areas are two and a half times more likely than the wealthiest to die from coronary heart disease.

The message is just not getting through. This is a burgeoning risk factor which will have consequences if we don't do something about it.

Dr Mac Armstrong

While praising the progress that had been made on health issues, Dr Armstrong admitted that promotional drives aimed at preventing women from smoking and drinking had not been a success.

He said: "The message is just not getting through. This is a burgeoning risk factor which will have consequences if we don't do something about it."

"Worldwide smoking in women is widely considered as something to do with equality and tobacco companies are well aware that this is a fact and quite often target their promotional drives to emphasise it.

"Excess drinking, particularly among younger women, is also to do with that.

"Keeping up with the lads is an equality statement, but the fact is that women's physiology is not equipped to deal with it as well as men's, so keeping up with the lads is not a good thing to do.

"That's not a sexist statement, it's a physiological statement."