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.

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International Journal of Health Policy and Management
Volume 8, Issue 1
January 2019
Pages 1-3

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History

  • Receive Date: 18 July 2018
  • Revise Date: 07 October 2018
  • Accept Date: 09 October 2018
  • First Publish Date: 01 January 2019

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