Health Inequalities

On October 17-18, the first Annual Convention of the European Platform against Poverty and Social Exclusion took place in Krakow, Poland. Although the aim is to make suggestions on how to reduce poverty, no concrete and inspiring suggestions for future actions toward achieving the goal were made. Health inequalities were also absent from the meeting. In 2010, the European Union committed to reduce the number of people living in poverty by 20 Million before 2020. This is one of the targets (...)

The Marmot Review Team has launched a consultation on the "European Review of the Social Determinants of Health and the Health Divide in the WHO European Region". Deadline: 25 November 2011. EPHA prepares a response that will be available for the December 2011 Newsletter. The consultation is directed towards individuals and organisations from across the 53 countries of the European Region, from within all sectors and levels of government. It is to get feedback on the early emerging (...)

The very first meeting of the EU Stakeholders Group of the EU Platform against Poverty and Social Exclusion gathered around 80 multi-level stakeholders from areas of health, poverty, social and labour policy, equity, gender and development to discus group’s mandate, composition and how to best adapt its working methods to the Europe 2020 strategy objectives to truly deliver for the Platform’s goals. On 22 June, EPHA Secretariat participated in the first stakeholder meeting of (...)

A new Report shows that fuel poverty increases respiratory, cardiovascular and mental health diseases. In addition, it also impacts on educational achievements of children, dietary choices, and increased home injuries and accidents. Commissioned by Friends of the Earth UK, the Marmot Review Team produced a comprehensive review realigning the environmental and health agendas to provide powerful evidence on the health benefits of reducing fuel poverty and improving the thermal efficiency of (...)

The European Commission adopted the EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies showing its committment to Roma inclusion in four key areas - access to education, healthcare, employment and essential services. However, many Roma advocates have already criticised the framework for not specifying real measures to combat discrimination towards the Roma community Further to several EU Summits on the Roma population, the Communication on the socio-economic integration of the Roma and (...)

Social Affairs Ministers adopted conclusions on the European platform against poverty and social exclusion, establishing their position on the key elements of one of the seven flagship initiatives of the Europe 2020 Strategy. The Platform will be the main framework for action at EU level to combat poverty to meet the EU target of lifting 20 million people out of poverty. On the 7 March 2011, Ministers of Social Affairs met in the EPSCO Council and highlighted that 1 out of 6 people are at (...)

On 9 March, the European Parliament adopted a resolution that supports an EU-wide strategy to support the social inclusion of Roma communities. This comes a month before the Commission is due to present proposals on creating an EU framework for national Roma integration strategies for the EU`s 10 million Roma. The resolution calls for binding minimum standards at EU level to improve access to employment, education, housing and healthcare for Roma, as well as better protection of (...)

The joint WHO European Region/ European Commission Equity Project has just released a briefing to explore how EU Structural Funds can contribute to the reduction of health inequities in the European Union and the potential role of health systems and public health infrastructures. It describes the opportunities for health systems to influence the use of Structural Funds to reduce health inequities; identifies the challenges in using Structural Funds to reduce health inequities; and explores (...)

The WHO Regional Office for Europe has started a regional review of the health divide and inequalities in health in July 2010 (ongoing) in order to inform the new health policy for the Region. The first interim report is published, identifying the barriers and opportunities to reduce health inequalities. The first phase of the review assessed levels of inequalities in health across the European Region and identified the barriers to and opportunities for reducing these. After this interim (...)

The recent publication from the WHO European Region presents a short analysis of rural poverty and health systems in the region. The social determinants of health − the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work and age − are mostly responsible for health inequities, defined as the unfair and avoidable differences in health status seen within and between countries (WHO, 2009). In many countries of the WHO European Region poverty rates are higher in rural areas and (...)