Reducing Health Inequities Through Intersectoral Action: Balancing Equity in Health With Equity for Other Social Goods

Document Type : Perspective

Authors

1 School of Health Studies, Faculty of Health Sciences, Western University, London, ON, Canada

2 Institute for Health and Social Policy, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada

Abstract

Significant attention has been devoted to developing intersectoral strategies to reduce health inequities; however, these strategies have largely neglected to consider how equity in health ought to be weighted and balanced with the pursuit of equity for other social goods (eg, education equity). Research in this domain is crucial, as the health sector’s pursuit of health equity may be at odds with policies in other sectors, which may consider the reduction of health inequities to be peripheral to, if not incompatible with, their own equity-related aims. It is therefore critical that intersectoral strategies to reduce health inequities be guided by a more general account of social justice that is capable of carefully balancing equity in health against the pursuit of equity in other sectors.

Highlights

 

Watch the Video Summary here.

 

Keywords

Main Subjects


 

 

  1. World Health Organization. Intersectoral Governance for Health in All Policies: Structures, Actions and Experiences. Copenhagen, Denmark: World Health Organization; 2012.
  2. Povall SL, Haigh FA, Abrahams D, Scott-Samuel A. Health equity impact assessment. Health Promot Int. 2014;29(4):621-633. doi:10.1093/heapro/dat012
  3. Public Health Agency of Canada. Canadian Reference Group on Social Determinants of Health. Ottawa, ON: Public Health Agency of Canada; 2011.
  4. Mikkonen J, Raphael D. Social Determinants of Health: The Canadian Facts. Toronto: York University School of Health Policy and Management; 2010.
  5. Danaher A. Reducing Health Inequities: Enablers and Barriers to Inter-sectoral Collaboration. Toronto, Canada: Wellesley Institute; 2011.
  6. Kreisel W, von Schirnding Y. Intersectoral action for health: a cornerstone for health for all in the 21st century. World Health Stat Q. 1998;51(1):75-78.
  7. Ndumbe-Eyoh S, Moffatt H. Intersectoral action for health equity: a rapid systematic review. BMC Public Health. 2013;13:1056. doi:10.1186/1471-2458-13-1056
  8. World Health Organization. Health equity through intersectoral action: An analysis of 18 country case studies. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2008.
  9. Storm I, den Hertog F, van Oers H, Schuit AJ. How to improve collaboration between the public health sector and other policy sectors to reduce health inequalities? - A study in sixteen municipalities in the Netherlands. Int J Equity Health. 2016;15:97. doi:10.1186/s12939-016-0384-y
  10. de Leeuw E. Engagement of Sectors Other than Health in Integrated Health Governance, Policy, and Action. Annu Rev Public Health. 2017;38:329-349. doi:10.1146/annurev-publhealth-031816-044309
  11. Holt DH, Rod MH, Waldorff SB, Tjornhoj-Thomsen T. Elusive implementation: an ethnographic study of intersectoral policymaking for health. BMC Health Serv Res. 2018;18(1):54. doi:10.1186/s12913-018-2864-9
  12. Lawless A, Baum F, Delany-Crowe T, et al. Developing a Framework for a Program Theory-Based Approach to Evaluating Policy Processes and Outcomes: Health in All Policies in South Australia. Int J Health Policy Manag. 2017;7(6):510-521. doi:10.15171/ijhpm.2017.121
  13. Shankardass K, Muntaner C, Kokkinen L, et al. The implementation of Health in All Policies initiatives: a systems framework for government action. Health Res Policy Syst. 2018;16(1):26. doi:10.1186/s12961-018-0295-z
  14. Goldhaber DD. School Choice: An Examination of the Empirical Evidence on Achievement, Parental Decision Making, and Equity. Educational Researcher. 1999;28(9):16-25. doi:10.3102/0013189x028009016
  15. Commission on Social Determinants of Health. Closing the gap in a generation: Health equity through action on the social determinants of health. Final report of the Commission on Social Determinants of Health. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2008.
  16. Brighouse H. School Choice and Social Justice. New York: Oxford University Press; 2000.
  17. Weinstock DM. Can thinking about justice in health help us in thinking about justice in education? Theory Res Educ. 2010;8(1):79-91. doi:10.1177/1477878509356344
  18. Powers M, Faden R. Social Justice: The Moral Foundations of Public Health and Health Policy. New York: Oxford University Press; 2006.
  19. Smith MJ. Health Equity in Public Health: Clarifying our Commitment. Public Health Ethics. 2015;8(2):173-184. doi:10.1093/phe/phu042
  20. Ruger JP. Health and Social Justice. New York: Oxford University Press; 2010.
  21. Daniels N. Just Health: Meeting Health Needs Fairly. New York: Cambridge University Press; 2007.
  22. Venkatapuram S. Health Justice: An Argument from the Capabilities Approach. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press; 2011.
  23. Segall S. Health, Luck, and Justice. Princeton: Princeton University Press; 2009.
Volume 8, Issue 1
January 2019
Pages 1-3
  • Receive Date: 18 July 2018
  • Revise Date: 07 October 2018
  • Accept Date: 09 October 2018
  • First Publish Date: 01 January 2019