Strabane people most anxious in Tyrone?

A STUDY tracking changing well-being trends has shown Strabane to be a much more anxious place than its fellow Tyrone districts, which ranked Fermanagh and Omagh as the tenth ‘least anxious’ area in the UK.

The analysis, which looked at data from 354 districts across the North, England, Scotland and Wales, suggested local anxiety levels are roughly seven per-cent above the UK average.

In addition, Strabane and Derry City recorded a life satisfaction rating that fell nearly two per-cent beneath the norm. This bucked the county-wide trend, which was much more sanguine.

In fact, Fermangh and Omagh found itself with an anxiety rating 27 per-cent lower than the UK average, making it the tenth least anxious area surveyed.

In Mid Ulster, the picture was brighter yet, with people in the east of the county named the second least anxious population in the UK.

When it came to life satisfaction, people from around Dungannon and Cookstown got a score of over seven per-cent in excess of the UK average.

Although it is not clear how exactly the researchers defined ‘anxious’, their analysis was based on personal well-being estimates published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

The figures showed the North to be the least anxious of the four regions covered in the research, with an ‘average anxiety score’ of 2.91.

The most anxious district here was Antrim and Newtownabbey, with an average anxiety level over seven per-cent above the UK baseline.

Spelthorne, a local government district with borough status in Surrey, England, was ranked the most anxious area in the UK, with a rating 60 per-cent above average.

The numbers were published by a company called Go Smoke Free.