Editor's Choice

Health, wealth, and politics

BMJ 2008; 336 doi: 10.1136/bmj.39490.460162.DE (Published 14 February 2008)
Cite this as: BMJ 2008;336:7640

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  1. Trish Groves, deputy editor, BMJ
  1. tgroves{at}bmj.com

    The idea that, in a developed country, more equal distribution of wealth is associated with better health is remarkably provocative. Can it be true? Is it a scientific or political theory? Does it have any place in a general medical journal?

    The BMJ pitched into this debate more than 10 years ago with a series of articles introduced by Richard Wilkinson, currently professor of social epidemiology in Nottingham (www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/314/7080/591). Now Tony Blakely and colleagues shed further light on the Wilkinson hypothesis (doi: 10.1136/bmj.39455.596181.25). They examined trends in mortality in a natural experiment in New Zealand during the l980s and 1990s, when economic reforms led …

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