Global Health and Development

7 Key excerpts on "Global Health and Development"

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  Health for Some

  The Political Economy of Global Health Governance

  • S. MacLean, S. Brown, P. Fourie, S. MacLean, S. Brown, P. Fourie(Authors)
  • 2015(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  Part I Introduction 3 1 Introduction: The Social Determinants of Global Health: Confronting Inequities Sandra J. MacLean and Sherri A. Brown Health, at a population level, is largely socially determined; consequently, rich countries and communities tend to have significantly better health out- comes than poor ones. In the current era, this observation is critical, given that globalization has been implicated in producing economic convergence within and between some countries, but appreciably greater socioeconomic gaps in others (Farmer, 2003; OECD, 2008). To grasp the nature of health and disease in the world today, therefore, entails understanding not only biological phenomena, but also who wins and who loses as a result of the recent changes in global political economy. Moreover, to be effective, global health governance must address the underlying structures of political econ- omy that are primary sources of social inequalities and inequities and thus contributors to negative health outcomes (CSDH, 2008). Over the past two to three decades, several health problems with world- wide implications have emerged to spawn an explosion of interest in ‘global health’. The burgeoning literature on the subject has produced important and informative research on a set of issues. However, there are problems with the current situation in global health analysis. First, there are concep- tual problems. The notion of global health is not often clearly defined; it is frequently used, for instance, in ways that do not distinguish it from the long-established concept of international health. Second, the weights given to the range of issues addressed are skewed; in particular, much of the atten- tion is focused on infectious disease to the detriment of research on chronic disease as a global health issue.

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  Culture and Health

  A Critical Perspective Towards Global Health

  • Malcolm MacLachlan(Author)
  • 2006(Publication Date)
  • Wiley

    (Publisher)

  CHAPTER 9 Global health According to Nussbam we must develop: an ability to see [ourselves] . . . not simply as citizens of some local region or group but also, and above all, as human beings bound to all other human beings by ties of recognition and concern because the world around us is inescapably international. Issues from business to agricul-ture, from human rights to the relief of famine, call our imaginations to venture beyond narrow group loyalties and to consider the reality of distant lives. Nussbam (1997, p. 10) Global health is about ‘the reality of distant lives’. This reality is hauntingly brought home to us by Mallaby (2002, p. A.29) when he writes: A century from now, when historians write about our era, one question will dwarf all others, and it won’t be about finance or politics or even ter-rorism. The question will be, simply, how could our rich and civilised society allow a known and beatable enemy to kill millions of people? That killer is of course HIV/AIDS and it is perhaps one of the most distress-ing exemplars of the global reach of human suffering and illness. In Chapter 1 we noted that McAuliffe (2003) defines global health as an attempt to address health problems that transcend national boundaries, may be influenced by circumstances and experiences in other countries, and are best addressed by cooperative actions and solutions. Within this perspective the world’s health problems are seen as shared problems and are therefore best tackled by shared solutions. An implicit aspiration is to work towards removing inequalities and privileges in accessing health, i.e. to establish health as a human right. Global health disparities The Global Forum for Health Research (GFHR) is dedicated to helping correct what they refer to as the ‘10/90’ gap (2004, p. 1), i.e. of the US$ 73 billion

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  Sustainable Development

  An Appraisal from the Gulf Region

  • Paul Sillitoe(Author)
  • 2014(Publication Date)
  • Berghahn Books

    (Publisher)

  Sustainable develop-ment, in turn, is economic and social development that ‘meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’ by irreparably damaging the environment (WCED 1987). The economic, socio-cultural and natural environment ‘pillars’ of 392 | Mylène Riva, Catherine Panter-Brick and Mark Eggerman sustainable development also correspond to the ‘social determinants of health’, i.e. the socio-environmental conditions in which people are born and live. These two dimensions of human experience are thus closely interlinked. Indeed, one recent editorial in The Lancet (2009) highlighted a definition of health that went far beyond medical considerations, as the ‘ability to adapt’ that is in terms of our human capability to respond to changing environmental conditions. We begin by reviewing the international agenda, detailing some of the key standpoints taken at international conferences on sustainable devel-opment, health and health care. We trace parallels in the ‘calls for action’ to achieve sustainable development and to achieve rights to health, in re-lation to the need for actions across different sectors of society and at mul-tiple levels of governance: namely, calls for integrated local, national and global action to achieve goals for good health and sustainable develop-ment. We examine health indicators within the GCC states and priorities and strategies for action to tackle the social and environmental deter-minants of health. Throughout this chapter, we highlight issues critical for inter- and intragenerational equity, issues that call for a political and scientific agenda than addresses the many tensions currently engendered from rapid population growth, shortfalls in economic development, and worrying health profiles.

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  Social work and global health inequalities

  Practice and policy developments

  • Bywaters, Paul, McLeod, Eileen(Authors)
  • 2009(Publication Date)
  • Policy Press

    (Publisher)

  But all social work has health impacts. As the examples presented in later chapters confirm, social work can act against inequalities in health through direct front-line intervention and service provision (see Chapters 10–12) and also through policy making, research and education (see Chapters 13 and 14). And as all these 12 Social work and global health inequalities chapters demonstrate, understanding how global health inequalities are produced and maintained calls for an extended repertoire of social work interventions. Social work action: the global context The context for understanding the social determinants of health is global as well as national and local. Indeed, the global context of people’s everyday lives has never been more immediately apparent. We are writing at the height of the credit crunch (Stanton, 2008) and shortly after the High-Level Conference on World Food Security: the Challenges of Climate Change and Bioenergy orchestrated by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations in June 2008. Intrinsic to the global context of health is the phenomenon of globalisation. The definition of globalisation, how it affects health and the consequences for health inequalities are all contested. Our position as editors is closest to that of Labonte and Schrecker (2007a) who emphasise the economic drivers behind the emergence of a global marketplace and the specific, neoliberal policies which have been dominant in the past 35 years. By neoliberal policies they mean ‘trade liberalization, the global reorganization of production and labour markets, debt crises and economic restructuring; financial liberalization …; influences that operate by way of the physical environment; and health systems changed by the global marketplace’ (Labonte and Schrecker, 2007b, p 2).

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  Introduction to Global Health Promotion

  • Rick S. Zimmerman, Ralph J. DiClemente, Jon K. Andrus, Everold N. Hosein, Rick S. Zimmerman, Ralph J. DiClemente, Jon K. Andrus, Everold N. Hosein(Authors)
  • 2016(Publication Date)
  • Jossey-Bass

    (Publisher)

  In the rest of this chapter, we consider strategies required for action on social determinants linked to health promotion around each of these five themes and present experiences of implementation in low- and middle-income countries. We then reflect on how the global health promotion community can best contribute to supporting successful implementation of the required strategies to address social determinants at local, national, and global levels to reduce health inequities.

  Box 3.1: The Social Determinants of Health

  The social determinants of health are the social, political, economic, and environmental conditions and cultural forces in which people are born, grow, live, work, and age (Commission on Social Determinants of Health, 2008). These circumstances, which include the health system, are shaped by the distribution of money, power, and resources at global, national, and local levels, which are themselves influenced by policy choices. The social determinants of health are mostly responsible for health inequities—unfair and avoidable or remediable differences in health between populations within countries and between countries (Whitehead, 1992).

  Over the past 25 years, there have been significant advances in understanding the social determinants of health (henceforth “social determinants”) and their crucial role in generating health inequities. At the conceptual level, this work has been led by social epidemiologists such as Goran Dahlgren, Margaret Whitehead, and Michael Marmot (Dahlgren & Whitehead, 2006; M. Marmot et al., 2010; M. G. Marmot et al., 1991; Marmot & Wilkinson, 2005; Whitehead, 1990; Whitehead & Dahlgren, 2006), drawing attention to the wide inequities in health status within and between countries, and putting forward models of social processes to explain these inequities, rebutting the idea that they are reasonable or due to genetic, natural, or inevitable endowments.

  There has been growing consideration of how global organizations and stakeholders can best contribute to action within countries on social determinants to reduce inequities. In 2005, the World Health Organization, responding to the trends of widening global health inequities and increased understanding of the importance of social determinants, convened the Commission on Social Determinants of Health, chaired by Michael Marmot. The Commission's main objectives were to gather and examine the evidence on social determinants and provide support to countries in tackling the social causes of poor health and health inequities. The Commission brought together a global network of policymakers, researchers, and civil society leaders with a three-year mandate (2005–2008) to identify what was needed to reduce health inequities within and between countries and to report its recommendations for action to the director-general of WHO. The Commission's final report, “Closing the Gap in a Generation,” was released in 2008. This report presented 56 recommendations for policies across all sectors based around three overarching themes (Commission on Social Determinants of Health, 2008):

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  Health and Development

  Toward a Matrix Approach

  • A. Gatti, A. Boggio, A. Gatti, A. Boggio(Authors)
  • 2008(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  4 Research and Innovation in Health and Development Stephen A. Matlin The last two decades have seen a profound change in our understanding of the relationship between health and development. This has involved a shift from the view that good health will be achieved as an outcome of devel- opment to a perspective that regards improving health as an indispensable contributor to development. The change in viewpoint was punctuated by series of international conferences (including the UN International Confer- ence on Population and Development held in Cairo in 1994 and the Fourth World Conference on Women held Beijing in 1995) that culminated in the MDGs in 2000 and the case was cogently presented in the report of the Com- mission on Macroeconomics and Health in 2001 (World Health Organization 2001). A second change in perspective is now also being seen, involving a widen- ing of approach to the areas of health requiring attention. The traditional view has been that the health problems of low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) are predominantly due to communicable diseases – especially a range of tropical parasitic diseases such as malaria, African and South American forms of trypanosomiasis, leishmaniasis, schistosomiasis and filariasis, as well as TB and, more recently, HIV/AIDS – and to maternal and perinatal conditions and nutritional deficiencies. While this remains true in Africa, where over 60 per cent of the deaths in 2002 were due to infectious diseases (World Health Organization 2004b), it is not the case in the rest of LMICs. In every WHO region except AFRO, noncommunicable diseases now account for the majority of deaths (Figure 4.1) (World Health Organization 2004a).

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  Sociology as Applied to Health and Medicine

  • Graham Scambler(Author)
  • 2018(Publication Date)
  • Bloomsbury Academic

    (Publisher)

  It is a broad field, addressing such issues as global ine-qualities in health; global threats to health, including climate change; health issues that span national borders; and the challenges for international health governance. One simplified model of the pathways linking globalization and health is from Woodward and colleagues ( 2001 ), shown in Figure 3.1 . In this 44 Sociology as Applied to Health and Medicine model, the drivers of globalization have direct influences on health through international trade agreements (which dictate, for instance, pharmaceutical prices or the economic viability of growing particular crops) and through cross-border exchanges such as those of infectious disease, or tobacco. There are also indirect influences which operate through national-level policies, with the effects of trade liberalization felt in terms of national expenditure on health systems and workforces, and on the determinants of health, such as availability of work or affordable food (see Chapter 2 ). Although the arrows in this model illustrate the ways in which globalization impacts on health, it is important to note that there are flows back up the system: if the health of the working population is diminished by HIV infection, for instance, this will Driving forces, facilitating factors and constraints World markets National economy, politics, and society Health-related sectors Population level health influences Individual health risks Household economy Health Health care system Globalization Figure 3.1 Global health pathways Source : Woodward et al. ( 2001 ) 3 Globalization and Health 45 damage household economies, and reduce trade, as well as erode the pool of potential people who can train as health care workers.

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