...A L I T I E S IN T H E U N I T E D S TAT E S THE ECONOMIC BURDEN OF HEALTH INEQUALITIES IN THE UNITED STATES Thomas A. LaVeist, Ph.D. Darrell J. Gaskin, Ph.D. Patrick Richard, Ph.D. September 2009 foreward Not everyone in the United States enjoys the same health opportunities. Studies show that minority Americans experience poorer than average health outcomes from cradle to the grave. They are much more likely to die as infants, have higher rates of diseases and disabilities, and have shorter life spans. As the U.S. Congress and the Obama Administration work toward enactment of legislation to reform America’s health care system, a central focus of the debate has been the projected cost of ensuring accessible and affordable health care to every citizen. While some have struggled with the premise that health care reform can actually reduce health-related spending, the experience of racial and ethnic minorities under our current health care system is a strong indication that improving opportunities for good health – and minimizing inequities in health care access and outcomes – may well be good for the nation’s fiscal health, as well. This study, commissioned by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies and carried out by leading researchers from Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland, provides important insight into how much of a financial burden racial disparities are putting on our health care system and society at large. The researchers examined...
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...Matter Of Social Justice Social Justice Issues are happening everywhere in the world. These problems are a result of unfair wealth and resource distribution of people with diverse cultures. The term social justice issues were first used around 1840 by the Catholics, this was published by (Michael Novak). Consequently, nobody deserves to battle for education, poverty or access to health care “medical assistance”, it should be the same opportunities for everyone. However, this is not the case which is a reason we should fight for social justice and deal with one of many issues “social inequality”. “Social inequality creates a disadvantage against...
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...mental and social well-being" for all individuals, and ensuring that "equals are treated equally" in policy creation, it is perhaps best to look at models that are already achieving these goals and examine how they can be reapplied elsewhere. Even though places such as Japan, Italy, and Iceland are often referenced as being the healthiest countries in the world, I argue that taking policy ideas from other countries is not the best idea since they do not share the same deeply ingrained cultural and socio-economic problems as the United States. For the best example of policies that improved socio-economic, infrastructure, and health inequalities, I will reference the 2017 United Health Foundation report...
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...08/10/2014 HEALTH PROMOTION The Effects of Socioeconomic Influences of Health LO1 ICON COLLEGE (LO1) = TASK 1 1 • The notes contained in this PowerPoint presentation will cover LO1 (1.1;1.2;1.3) • Please print notes prior to attending lectures ICON COLLEGE (LO1) = TASK 1 2 1 08/10/2014 Learning Outcomes (LO) On successful completion of this lecture a learner will: LO1: Understand the socio-economic influences on health 1.1 explain the effects of socio-economic influences on health. 1.2 assess the relevance of government sources in reporting on inequalities in health. 1.3 discuss reasons for barriers to accessing healthcare. ICON COLLEGE (LO1) = TASK 1 3 Unit Content (LO1) Influences: social e.g. disposable income, unemployment, lifestyle choices, environment, access to healthcare facilities, access to information, citizenship status, discrimination. Sources of information: reports and enquiries e.g. Black Report DHSS 1980, Acheson Report ‘Independent Inquiry in ‘Inequalities in Health’ 1998, Health and Lifestyle Surveys (HALS), Health Survey for England (HSFE), census data ICON COLLEGE (LO1) = TASK 1 4 2 08/10/2014 Definitions (Class participation Review) • What is health promotion? • What is public health? • What do we mean by determinant of health? • What do we mean by environmental factors? ICON COLLEGE (LO1) = TASK 1 5 The main determinants of health Dahlgren and Whitehead's model, 1992 Figure 1: adapted from...
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...Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and inhumane.” Profound racial and economic disparities in health have long been the norm in the United States. Continuing to perpetuate economic and racial inequalities results in different health outcomes for marginalized communities. Despite efforts to improve healthcare access, racial and economic disparities persist. Unequal health has been an ongoing issue for decades and there are many pieces involved that have created this situation. This paper explores the systemic factors that contribute to racial and economic differences in healthcare, including biases and the lack of diversity in healthcare leadership. Racial inequality is...
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...Concepts of inequality and structural violence is advanced by Farmer in his work, Infections and Inequalities: The Modern Plagues. The novel shines light on the specific inequalities of women (Farmer 2011 [1996], 2001 [1999]), as well as those with various views and understanding of the disease on an individual and international aid sponsor country scale (Farmer 2006a [1992], 2006b [1994], 2011 [1996], 2001 [1999]). Farmer connects biomedicine and anthropology throughout the book addressing challenges involving the perceived causes of TB in Haiti. Identifying it as rationalized suffering (Farmer 2001 [1999]). Stating that “the anthropologist within me is perfectly satisfied to analyze such explanations, but to a physician it is nothing less...
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...occurs because the person is in a particular place at a particular time. Other reasons can be due to lack of resource, skills or both, economic inequality, poverty, and social problems. Also, human services clients can have a large range of family problems that can lead to more difficult problems. The problems that human service clients face are normally multiple. One issue could lead to another resulting in various problems. Economic inequality is linked to health and social problems. Inequality places people in a social chain of command which grows a need for competition causes stress, leading to poor health and social effects. (http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/tackling-inequality-and-poverty/). Unemployment and poor wages are contributors to economic equality, for the most part due to lack of skills or education. Growth in technology renders joblessness at all skills level. . Having low to zero income contributes to poor or no health care and poverty. Poverty is a result of economic inequality. The United States Census Bureau defines poverty as an "economic condition in which people lack sufficient income to obtain basic needs for food, housing, clothing, health services and education." It is a standard of living below the minimum needed for maintaining adequate food, health and shelter Some reasons that contribute to this social problem are ignorance, by means of lacking knowledge, apathy, dependency, and illness. Poverty is powerlessness and is an issue faced...
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...HEALTH DISPARITIES Health disparity is defined as inequality in health or the gaps in the quality of health care across races, ethnic and socioeconomic groups. Health disparities can also be defined as the significant differences between one population and another. The Minority Health and Health Disparities Research and Education Act of 2000 describe these disparities as differences in the overall rate of disease incidence, prevalence, morbidity, mortality or survival rates. Disparity in health is significant among some income, racial, and ethnic groups in America and is still expanding. Many Americans are in poor health and do not receive the best medical care. While these problems affect people of all groups, the challenges are especially acute for racial and ethnic minorities. When there is element of racism, poverty, and problematic community environment converge greater overall threats to health develop. The most powerful causes of health and health disparity are social and economic determinants or the community conditions for health. There are many reasons why disparities in access to of health care exist in our society. A lot of low income people in America cannot afford health insurance and as such they neglect their health. Some people cannot afford money to buy medication. Because these people did not have insurance they lack a regular source of care. African Americans compared to white minority groups are less likely to seek medical care...
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...will define the concepts of inequality, accessibility and community participation in health care. I will also discuss these concepts and explain their origins in relation to the Ottawa Charter and the Declaration of Alma Ata. Furthermore I will provide examples of how these concepts are being addressed in New Zealand health policy. Inequality in Health Discussion and Definition of the Concept Within New Zealand significant inequalities in health exist. The reasons for these inequalities are linked with socioeconomic status, ethnicity, gender and the geographical area in which people live. There is also statistical evidence which highlights the fact that Maori, Pacific Islanders and people from lower socioeconomic backgrounds are dying at a younger age and generally have poorer health than other New Zealanders (Ministry of Health [MOH], 2002). The Reducing Inequalities in Health report (MOH, 2002) states that the primary causes of health inequality in New Zealand are directly related to the distribution of and access to resources such as income, education, employment and housing. The report also states that another major influence on this inequality in health is the difference in how and when people access health care services and how that care may differ between those receiving the services. This is also said to have a significant impact both on peoples’ health status and mortality rates. Primary health care services will focus on better health for a population, and actively...
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...The ideas of health care have changed tremendously in the past years. Health services are provided in many ways and the funding is now more accessible. Outstanding changes in public health have changed life over the past century. Health care became an area of concern as early as the 1900’s. It was during The Great Depression in the 1930’s when priorities changed with greater emphasis on unemployment insurance and “old age” benefits. Between 1940 and 1950 President Roosevelt asked Congress for “economic bill of rights,” including right to adequate medical care and later on President Truman would offer a national health program plan involving a single system that would include all of American society. Unfortunately, this agreement would be terminated by the American Medical Association (AMA), and is called a Communist plot by a House subcommittee. It wasn’t until the start of the decade during the 1950’s that national health care expenditures were 4.5 percent of the Gross National Product (PBS, 2010), and then later on in the 1970’s an effort brought forth by the World Health Organization planned to achieve “Health for All” by the year 2000. Declaration of Alma-Ata International Conference on Primary Health Care, Alma Ata, USSR, 6-12 September 1978 Governments have a responsibility for the heath of their people, which can be fulfilled only by the provision of adequate health and social measures. A main social target of governments, international organizations and the whole...
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...To describe the major points of the inequality between nations, I have broken the following points into specific areas of inequality. Income Inequality The need to address inequality has increased since the economic crisis including increasing levels of uncertainty and social decline within the middle class with many societies. The drivers of inequalities are globalization, skill biased technology changes and policy changes. Developing countries that embrace globalization are seeing an increase in personal incomes, extended life expectancy, and improved education systems. Gender Inequality To create new sources of economic growth and utilizing everyone’s skills we would require a breakdown of barriers in gender equality in employment, education and entrepreneurship. “Greater educational attainment has accounted for about half of the economic growth in OECD countries in the past 50 years, in large part thanks to an increase in girls reaching higher levels of education and greater gender equality in the number of years spent in school. Companies with a higher proportion of women in top management do better than others” ("Inequality - OECD," n.d.). A familiar and yet disappoint static states women earn 16% less than men, and female top-earners are paid 21%...
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...other determinants to affect the health status of Aboriginal Canadian women. Determinants of health refer to the circumstances in which people are born, live, grow, work, and age, that are responsible for most of the health inequalities that exist. Common determinants contributing to sub-par health status include: early child development, education, income, employment, social and physical environment, personal health practices and coping skills, access to health services, racism, and gender. These determinants work alongside Aboriginal-specific determinants like cultural identity, self-determination, and colonialism to create significant health discrepancies compared to non-Aboriginal Canadians. Aboriginal women are at an even greater disadvantage because of the role gender plays on top of the other determinants. The term gender refers to the socially constructed perceptions of feminine and masculine and is not to be confused with sex, which refers to the biological differences between men and women (Steckley and Letts 2010). While the two are different concepts, they are closely related and do influence each other because while biology may condition behaviour, it is in turn conditioned by the social environment (Halseth 2013). Health is also a social construct and issue, rather than simply a medical and technical problem associated with body parts and their functions. Because it is defined by and shaped in social, psychological, and economic environments and relationships,...
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...element of health and illness. These things will include the introduction of social groups and looking at their statistics. “A social group is a collection of people who interact with each other and share similar characteristics and a sense of unity. A social category is a collection of people who do not interact but who share similar characteristics. For example, women, men, the elderly, and high school students all constitute social categories. A social category can become a social group when the members in the category interact with each other and identify themselves as members of the group.” - Anonymous, 2014. No only will I be looking at the social elements, but how it links in to health and trends in illness to find out just how the can both relate. Things such as Morbidity rates (the counted statistic rate in which disease appears in the population). Not forgetting other patterns in health including mortality rate known to be the amount of deaths calculated per annum along with many other rates that can effect the illness of social groups and reasons as to why and how these rates may effect them. As previously mentioned before a social group is a collection of people who interact with each other and share similar characteristics and a sense of unity. A social category is a collection of people who do not interact but who share similar characteristics. For example, women, men, the elderly, and high school students all constitute social categories. A social category can...
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...Gender and Health Gender is a crucial element in health inequities as it influences the control men and women have over the determinants of their health, including their economic position and social status, access to resources and treatment in society. Decades of active lobbying by non-governmental organizations and women’s rights advocates have had a major influence in ‘gendering’ health policies, such as the shift in focus from family planning to reproductive health paradigms and the global acknowledgement that violence against women is as much a health issues as a social issue. The Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen, in his seminal book ‘Development as Freedom’, emphatically stressed the relationship between women's education, social status and overall child and maternal health when he made education and health as the two basic capabilities that makes life meaningful and the enjoyment of freedom possible. Analysis of economic and socio-cultural context is an important component of health policy analysis because contextual factors significantly influence the health policy process and the overall health of population directly and indirectly. Paying attention to contextual factors helps in understanding the role of the state, society and market forces influencing health agenda, health planning and implementation, and even more important health outcomes. Health as a sector best typifies the fallacy of the trickledown theory – that despite periods of high economic growth and activity...
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...Health Disparities Solutions: Nurses Can Make a Difference Can Nurses make a difference in reducing health disparities? I believe we can make a big difference, Nurses can work with communities in a “grassroots” type movement to bring attention to the gravity of the inequities built into our current healthcare system. Healthcare is first and foremost about people, and care should be directed by the needs of the people it serves. Secondly, caring is foundational to nursing and this is a concept must be deeply woven throughout all points of health care. The third aspect is the vast pit of inequalities in healthcare; the injustices, denial of treatment and quality healthcare to minorities and the disadvantaged poor. Nurses are known patients advocates, therefore nurses are well equipped, to become leaders, in constructing equitable changes in the system and improve the model of care. Nurses are well- appointed in their understanding, negotiating skills, knowledge of healthcare and patient centered care, to provide guidance and direction to implement meaningful changes. Research in health disparities has identified, that the U.S is burdened by huge social and economic inequalities; it identifies, discrimination, social status, income inequality, and policy decisions as the principal causes of health disparities. The nursing profession needs to reconsider its role and its purpose in reducing health disparities, they need to be proactive in establishing...
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