Public health and inequities

Perceptions of gender inequality may motivate people to take action against inequality given its negative impact on various domains of people's everyday lives. Thus, it is crucial to develop reliable measures that consider the multidimensional nature of gender inequalities. In this research, we propose and assess the psychometric properties of the Multidimensional Gender Inequality Perception Scale (MuGIPS). This is a self-reported measure of perceived gender inequality in four domains: health, violence, household work and caregiving, and public sphere and power...

Artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms are prone to bias at multiple stages of model development, with potential for exacerbating health disparities. However, bias in imaging AI is a complex topic that encompasses multiple coexisting definitions. Bias may refer to unequal preference to a person or group owing to preexisting attitudes or beliefs, either intentional or unintentional. However, cognitive bias refers to systematic deviation from objective judgment due to reliance on heuristics, and statistical bias refers to differences between true and expected values, commonly manifesting as systematic error in model prediction (ie, a model with output unrepresentative of real-world conditions)...

INTRODUCTION: Low birth weight (LBW) is a global issue prevalent in low-income countries. Economic assessments of interventions to reduce this burden are crucial to guide health policies. However, there is a relative scarcity of research that illustrates the magnitude of LBW by country and region to support the design of public policies. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to analyze the temporal trend of fetal growth in newborns in Brazil between 2010 and 2020. METHODS: A time series study was conducted using data from the Live Births Information System (SINASC), which is managed by the Department of Information and Informatics of the Unified Health System (DATASUS) of the Brazilian Ministry of Health...

BACKGROUND AND AIM: Long Covid is often stigmatised, particularly in people who are disadvantaged within society. This may prevent them from seeking help and could lead to widening health inequalities. This coproduced study with a Community Advisory Board (CAB) of people with Long Covid aimed to understand healthcare and wider barriers and stigma experienced by people with probable Long Covid. METHODS: An active case finding approach was employed to find adults with probable, but not yet clinically diagnosed, Long Covid in two localities in London (Camden and Merton) and Derbyshire, England...

BACKGROUND: To describe the burden and examine transnational inequities in overall cardiovascular disease (CVD) and ten specific CVDs across different levels of societal development. METHODS: Estimates of disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs) for each disease and their 95% uncertainty intervals (UI) were extracted from the Global Burden of Diseases (GBD). Inequalities in the distribution of CVD burdens were quantified using two standard metrics recommended absolute and relative inequalities by the World Health Organization (WHO), including the Slope Index of Inequality (SII) and the relative concentration Index...

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this review was to describe how health service and delivery systems in high-income countries define and operationalize health equity. A secondary objective is to identify implementation strategies and indicators being used to integrate and measure health equity. INTRODUCTION: To improve the health of populations, a population health and health equity approach is needed. To date, most work on health equity integration has focused on reducing health inequities within public health, health care delivery, or providers within a health system, but less is known about integration across the health service and delivery system...

BACKGROUND: Planetary health equity (PHE) is defined here as equitable good health in a stable Earth system. PHE is arguably in crisis. Human-made climate change is damaging global populations through hotter temperatures, wildfires, and more severe and frequent storms, flooding, and landslides. A tsunami of health inequities will result from this, as pre-existing health conditions and inequities in living and working conditions ensure that socially disadvantaged groups and people in low-income and middle-income countries are disproportionately affected by climate change...

BACKGROUND: Given the effect of urbanisation on land use, allocation, and implementation of urban green spaces, we attempt to analyse the sociospatial distribution and equity in access to urban parks in Bengaluru, India, also known as the garden city of India. METHODS: Geospatial method was used for mapping the park's distribution and measuring the accessibility using road network data. To understand equitable access to the parks, four socioeconomic parameters from 2011 census (ie, population density, children aged 6 years or younger, proxy wealth index, and the Scheduled Caste population) were correlated with the parks' accessibility...

BACKGROUND: Suicide represents a major public health concern, affecting a significant portion of individuals. However, there remains a gap in understanding the age and sex disparities in the occurrence of suicide. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the sex-related inequalities in suicide rates in Ghana from 2000 to 2019. METHODS: We utilized data from the WHO Health Equity Assessment Toolkit (HEAT) online software. We analysed sex differences in both crude and age-standardized suicide rates in Ghana spanning from 2000 to 2019...

INTRODUCTION: Improving sustainable transportation options will help cities tackle growing challenges related to population health, congestion, climate change and inequity. Interventions supporting active transportation face many practical and political hurdles. Implementation science aims to understand how interventions or policies arise, how they can be translated to new contexts or scales and who benefits. Sustainable transportation interventions are complex, and existing implementation science frameworks may not be suitable...

BACKGROUND: The prevalence of asthma is gradually increasing worldwide and there are socioeconomic inequalities in the risk of developing asthma. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to evaluate whether the lifestyle is associated with asthma in adults, as well as whether and to what extent healthy lifestyles may modify socioeconomic status (SES) inequities in asthma. METHODS: This study included a total of 223951 participants from the UK Biobank. Smoking, physical activity, alcohol consumption, healthy diet patterns, sedentary time, and sleep duration items were used to construct the lifestyle score...

PURPOSE: Financial toxicity (FT) refers to the subjective perception of financial distress resulting from objective economic strain due to illness, exerting a detrimental influence on health outcomes. This study aimed to describe FT among allogeneic haematopoietic stem cell transplant (allo-HSCT) recipients within a public health framework, employing a social determinants of health approach. METHODS: A multi-centre cross-sectional study involving adult allo-HSCT patients was conducted across three public hospitals in Madrid...

BACKGROUND: Digital inequity refers to the inequality and exclusion experienced by those who lack the same opportunities or circumstances to support the development of digital skills as the rest of modern society. One rapidly growing and highly vulnerable group to digital inequity is older people attempting to reintegrate into society after release from prison, where technology access is limited. Inadequate support for digital skills in this population entails widespread consequences for public health, human rights, social welfare and recidivism...

Wastewater-based epidemiology is a promising public health tool that can yield a more representative view of the population than case reporting. However, only about 80% of the U.S. population is connected to public sewers, and the characteristics of populations missed by wastewater-based epidemiology are unclear. To address this gap, we used publicly available datasets to assess sewer connectivity in the U.S. by location, demographic groups, and economic groups. Data from the U.S. Census' American Housing Survey revealed that sewer connectivity was lower than average when the head of household was American Indian and Alaskan Native, White, non-Hispanic, older, and for larger households and those with higher income, but smaller geographic scales revealed local variations from this national connectivity pattern...

AIMS: Social inequalities in mortality persist or even increase in high-income countries. Most evidence is based on a period approach to measuring mortality - that is, data from individuals born decades apart. A cohort approach, however, provides complementary insights using data from individuals who grow up and age under similar social and institutional arrangements. This study compares income inequalities in cohort life expectancy in two Swedish cohorts, one born before and one born after the expansion of the welfare state...

BACKGROUND: This study explores the role of health in daily life and needs of Dutch adults (aged 25-49) experiencing one or more forms of socioeconomic insecurity stemming from their financial, housing, or employment situations. METHODS: 28 in-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted in the Netherlands between October 2022 and February 2023. The interview guide included questions on participants' socioeconomic situation, the role of health in their daily lives, their health-related and broader needs...

BACKGROUND: Historically in Australia, all levels of government created collective wealth by owning and operating infrastructure, and managing natural assets, key public goods and essential services while being answerable to the public. This strong state tradition was challenged in the 1980s when privatisation became a widespread government approach globally. Privatisation involves displacing the public sector through modes of financing, ownership, management and product or service delivery...

BACKGROUND: Considering that dementia is an international public health priority, several countries have developed national dementia strategies outlining initiatives to address challenges posed by the disease. These strategies aim to improve the care, support, and resources available to meet the needs of persons living with dementia and their care partners and communities. Despite the known impact of social determinants of health on dementia risk, care, and outcomes, it is unclear whether dementia strategies adequately address related inequities...

Despite self-congratulatory rhetoric, Canada compromised COVID-19 vaccine equity with policies impeding a proposed global waiver of vaccine intellectual property (IP) rules. To learn from Canada's vaccine nationalism we explore the worldview - a coherent textual picture of the world - in a sample of Government of Canada communications regarding global COVID-19 vaccine sharing. Analysed documents portray risks and disparities as unrelated to the dynamics and power relations of the Canadian and international economies...

The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated acceptance of learning from other countries, especially for high-income countries to learn from low- and middle-income countries, a practice known as global learning. COVID-19's rapid disease transmission underscored how connected the globe is as well as revealed stark health inequities which facilitated looking outside of one's borders for solutions. The Global Learning for Health Equity (GL4HE) Network, supported by Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, held a 3-part webinar series in December 2021 to understand the current state of global learning and explore how global learning can advance health equity in the post-COVID-19 era...