A CSO Frontier Series Output - What is this?
The results presented in this release are based primarily on a data-linking exercise of the Computerised Infectious Disease Reporting (CIDR) provided to the CSO by the Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC) and the CSO's pseudonymised Census of Population 2016 Analysis (COPA) data set.
The linkage and analysis were undertaken by the CSO for statistical purposes in line with the Statistics Act, 1993 and the CSO Data Protocol.
Before using personal administrative data for statistical purposes, the CSO removes all identifying personal information including the PPSN. The CSO removes all personal data and creates a pseudonymised Protected Identifier Key (PIK). The PIK is a unique and non-identifiable number which is internal to the CSO. Using the PIK enables the CSO to link and analyse data for statistical purposes, while protecting the security and confidentiality of the individual data. All records in the matched datasets are pseudonymised and the results are in the form of statistical aggregates which do not identify any individuals.
Reference Period:
The demographic variables, such as place of work and household status, were collected on Census reference day, 24th April 2016.
COVID-19 wave dates:
Data Sources:
Census of Population Analysis (COPA)
The COPA is a pseudonymised copy of the Census of Population 2016 dataset held internally within the CSO for analysis purposes. It contains Census attribute information for individuals and households, excluding persons records registered as guests. Approximately 5% of Census records could not be assigned a PIK and were excluded from the analysis.
Computerised Infectious Disease Reporting (CIDR)
Provided by the HPSC, this data keeps records of all confirmed COVID-19 cases in Ireland. CIDR is an information system developed to manage the surveillance and control of infectious diseases in Ireland. Case-based data is collected in CIDR on the notifiable infectious diseases. Enhanced surveillance data is also collected on many infectious diseases. Infectious disease outbreak data is also collected in CIDR. There are currently 84 notifiable diseases, covering areas such as:
The full list of notifiable diseases can be found at www.hpsc.ie.
Other Definitions:
Disability
Data on disability was derived from answers to questions 16 and 17 of the Census questionnaire. Question 16 was a seven-part question that asked about the existence of the following long lasting conditions: (a) blindness or a serious vision impairment, (b) deafness or a severe hearing impairment, (c) a difficulty with basic physical activities such as walking, climbing stairs, reaching, lifting or carrying, (d) an intellectual disability (e) a difficulty with learning, remembering or concentrating, (f) a psychological or emotional condition and (g) a difficulty with pain, breathing or any other chronic illness or condition. If a person answered YES to any of the parts of Q16, they were then asked to answer Question 17. This was a four-part question that asked whether an individual had a difficulty doing any of the following activities: (a) dressing, bathing or getting around inside the home (self-care disability); (b) going outside the home alone to shop or visit a doctor’s surgery (going outside the home disability); (c) working at a job or business or attending school or college (employment disability) and (d) participating in other activities, such as leisure or using transport. Individuals were classified as having a disability if they answered YES to any part of the above two questions, including, in particular, if they ticked YES to any of the parts of Q17 even though they may not have ticked YES to any of the parts of Q16.
Education
In Census 2016 persons aged 15 years and over were asked the highest level of education (full or part time) completed to date. The levels ranged from no formal education to a tertiary post doctorate degree.
NACE Rev.2 Classification
The economic sector classification (NACE) is based on the ‘Statistical Classification of Economic Activities in the European Community, Rev. 2 (2008)’ [1] which can be accessed on the Eurostat website.
Occupations
The Occupation classification used here and in Census 2016, is based on the UK Standard Occupational [2], with modifications to reflect Irish labour market conditions.
Analysis by deprivation
By using the deprivation score developed by Trutz Haase (see https://www.pobal.ie/app/uploads/2018/06/The-2016-Pobal-HP-Deprivation-Index-Introduction-07.pdf) it is possible to analyse incidence rate by the deprivation score of the Electoral Division in which the person lived in April 2016. The results are presented by quintiles with the first quintile representing the least deprived areas and the fifth quintile representing the most deprived areas. The underlying assumption is that if a person’s usual residence is in an area assigned a particular deprivation score then that person attracts that particular score.
Socio-economic group
The entire population was classified to one of ten specific socio-economic groups (introduced in 1996). In addition, a residual group entitled. “All others gainfully occupied and unknown” was used where sufficient details were not provided. The classification aims to bring together persons with similar social and economic statuses on the basis of the level of skill or educational attainment required. In defining socio-economic group no attempt is made to rank groups in order of socio-economic importance.
The socio-economic group of persons aged 15 years or over who are at work is determined by their occupation (coded using Soc90) and employment status. Unemployed or retired persons aged 15 years or over are classified according to their former occupation and employment status.
Persons looking after the home/family or at school/ college, who are members of a family unit, were classified to the socio-economic group of another person in the family unit using a priority table based on the relationships within the family. Thus, if the reference person1 of a family was at work, unemployed or retired, other persons were assigned to his/her socio-economic group. If the reference person was neither at work, unemployed nor retired (e.g. never worked, permanently disabled, etc.), they were assigned to the socio-economic group of the other parent, spouse or cohabiting partner in the family unit. If there was no such spouse or partner or if the spouse, in turn, was neither at work, unemployed or retired, they were assigned to the socio-economic group of a working son/ daughter. If there were no persons in the family unit with a socio-economic group then they were assigned to the unknown socio-economic group. Other persons looking after the home/family or at school/college who were not members of a family unit, such as relatives of the reference person (e.g. widowed grandparents, etc.) were assigned a socio-economic group using the above method. Unrelated persons or persons living alone who are looking after the home/family or at school/college were assigned to the unknown group.
The socio-economic groups used in the census are as follows:
A Employers and managers
B Higher professional
C Lower professional
D Non-manual
E Manual skilled
F Semi-skilled
G Unskilled
H Own account workers
I Farmers
J Agricultural workers
Z All others gainfully occupied and unknown
1The reference person in each private household is the first person identified as a parent, spouse or cohabiting partner in the first family in the household. Where no person in the household satisfies these criteria, the first usually resident person is used as the reference person.
Census Geography:
Place of Work, School or College
As part of the Census 2016 processing programme places of work, school and college were geo-coded. All workers resident in Ireland on Census night were coded to their place of work and all Irish resident students from the age of 5 and upwards were coded to their place of school/college.
Nationality / Country of Birth:
We define EU-West as comprising the older EU15 Member States excluding the UK and Ireland, i.e. Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. EU-East comprises the EU Member States that acceded in 2004 and 2007, i.e. Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia.
