Helsinki residents have lower disease rates, but more psychosis

Helsinki residents have lower rates of common diseases than people in Finland overall, but psychosis is more prevalent in the capital, Yle reports. The city also has marked health differences between neighbourhoods.

Rates of the most common chronic diseases in Helsinki fell by 10 per cent between 2019 and 2025, mainly because coronary artery disease and hypertension became less common. The figures are based on data from Kela and Statistics Finland.

Healthier than the national average

Last year, rates of the most common diseases in Helsinki were more than 20 per cent below the national average. The city’s age-adjusted morbidity index was 84, compared with 100 for Finland as a whole.

However, psychosis is more common in Helsinki than elsewhere in the country on average. Psychoses are the most severe mental disorders and involve a disturbance in a person’s sense of reality.

Differences between neighbourhoods

Rates of illness are well below the city average in parts of central Helsinki and in the northernmost parts of the city. They are higher in neighbourhoods where residents have lower incomes.

Differences between neighbourhoods have widened slightly. The change between 2023 and 2025 was linked particularly to regional shifts in work incapacity.