"The University of Washington’s Dr. Stephen Bezruchka has been tracking these outcomes since the 1990s. The new research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Bezruchka tells me, should worry Americans at all income levels. “Even if we are rich, college-educated, white-skinned, and practice all the right health behaviors,” he notes, “similar people in other rich nations will live longer.” A dozen years ago, Bezruchka published in Newsweek the first American mass-media commentary to challenge the conventional take on poor U.S. global health rankings. To really understand America’s poor health standing globally, epidemiologists like Bezruchka posit, we need to look at those social and economic realities that define our daily lives, what scientists call “the social determinants of health.” And none of these determinants matter more, these researchers contend, than economic inequality, the divide between the affluent and everyone else. Over 170 studies worldwide have so far linked income inequality to health outcomes. The more unequal a modern society, the studies show, the more unhealthy most everyone in it — and not the poor alone."
Posted on: Sat, 24 Aug 2013 23:58:38 +0000
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