World Analysis of the Determinants of the Inequality in Health. Is the Measurement of Inequality Important?

Abstract

This essay has a double aim. On the one hand, to identify what are the determinants in the inequality in health. On the other hand, to estimate to what extent the inequality indicator used is important. To do this, we use a cross-sectional model for 176 countries. The achieved results allow concluding that the choice of the inequality measurement is a key element in this type of studies. Also, inequality in income distribution, the weight of the rural population and capitalism make inequality in health increase.

A global study of pain prevalence across 52 countries: examining the role of country-level contextual factors

“…The contextual variables represent domains of socioeconomic, political, cultural, and environmental conditions, selected based on availability of data, and previous literature on contextual factors considered to affect population health. 2,71…”

“…The contextual variables represent domains of socioeconomic, political, cultural, and environmental conditions, selected based on availability of data, and previous literature on contextual factors considered to affect population health. 2,71 When available, these measures are taken for the year 2003, the midpoint of the WHS data collection. In a small number of instances, for a few of the country-level variables, information for the year 2003 was not available.…”

“…39,43,44,49 Various social inequalities are also important factors when considering health disparities. 2 Studies demonstrate significant relationships between within-country income inequality, as measured by indicators like the Gini coefficient, and a variety of health outcomes. 56 Gender inequality has also been associated with some health outcomes 61 including musculoskeletal pain, 11 child mortality, 14 mental health, and overall self-rated health.…”

A global comparative study of wealth-pain gradients: Investigating individual- and country-level associations

“…There is a large body of literature exploring how health may be explained by country-level contextual characteristics that describe a country's structural conditions. These factors may represent socioeconomic, political, cultural, or environmental circumstances such as poverty rates, pollution, density, education levels, government policies, health expenditures, labor force factors, among others [ 26 , [36] , [37] , [38] , [39] , [40] , [41] , [42] ]. There is also an important line of debate around how population health may be impacted upon by the distribution of wealth [ 31 , 33 , 35 , [43] , [44] , [45] ].…”