Tackling health inequities

doi:10.1136/bmj.a1526

Published 3 September 2008, doi:10.1136/bmj.a1526
Cite this as: BMJ 2008;337:a1526

Editorials

Tackling health inequities

WHO report calls for global action to ensure health equity withinand between countries

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

Finally, an official report on health inequity has been publishedthat has the honesty and courage to say that "social injusticeis killing people on a grand scale."¹ The report of the WorldHealth Organization’s Commission on Social Determinantsof Health synthesises evidence from a large and disparate rangeof sources, while recognising that what constitutes evidenceis itself contested and not value free.² It presents a wealthof data to show the unquestionable link between economic, social,and bodily wellbeing—within and across countries. In thecase of life expectancy, these embodied facts of social inequity³can span the equivalent of a lifetime: women born in Botswanacan anticipate living an average of 43 years, half that of the86 years for women in Japan; between the poorest and most affluentparts of Glasgow life expectancy in men ranges from 54 to 82years.

Many official reports have documented social . . . [Full text of this article]

George Davey Smith, professor of clinical epidemiology¹, Nancy Krieger, professor²

¹ Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Social Medicine, University of Bristol, Bristol BS8 2PR, ² Department of Society, Human Development, and Health, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA 02115, USA

George.Davey-Smith@bristol.ac.uk

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