UK pushes EU to tackle health gap between rich and poor

doi:10.1136/bmj.331.7522.923

BMJ 2005;331:923 (22 October), doi:10.1136/bmj.331.7522.923

News

UK pushes EU to tackle health gap between rich and poor

Sophie Arie

London

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

The United Kingdom is using its term as president of the EuropeanUnion to urge the region to focus on reducing the differencein the health of rich and poor people.

"Almost all important health problems, and major causes of prematuredeath across Europe such as heart disease and cancer, are morecommon among people with lower levels of education and income,"said the UK secretary of state for health, Patricia Hewitt,who hosted an EU summit in London this week called "Tacklinghealth inequalities—governing for health" ( BMJ 2005;331:855[Free Full Text], Oct 15).

"Narrowing this health gap, and making good health a realityfor everyone, is essential if we are to create a Europe of socialjustice as well as prosperity," she said.

At the conference, which was attended by delegates from 25 Europeancountries and international health experts, Marko Kyprianou,the EU commissioner for health . . . [Full text of this article]

-->
Add to CiteULike CiteULike Add to Complore Complore Add to Connotea Connotea Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us Add to Digg Digg Add to Reddit Reddit Add to Technorati Technorati What's this?