Unequal Health: How Inequality Contributes to Health or Illness

by Grace Budrys

Overview

Unequal Health examines the reasons why stark differences in health and well-being persist, even as the health care industry and access to health care grow. The third edition of this powerful book retains the accessible style and focus on inequality from previous editions while featuring significant new material throughout.

After an overview of key themes, the book introduces the concept of epidemiology—measuring the number of people who are sick or dying—and offers an overview of health trends over time. Author Grace Budrys distills the latest research to consider the relevance of sex, race, income, and education, and relative social status on health. The book discusses disease, habits that contribute to health, the relationship between health care and health status, genetics, socioeconomic inequality, health policy, and more. The third edition features a new chapter on diet, an increased discussion of substance abuse and the attention it receives based on who is engaging in this behavior, new material on income and education variables and inequality, a new discussion of the Affordable Care Act and its impact, and more.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781442248496
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	01/31/2017
Edition description:	Third Edition
Pages:	214
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.90(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Grace Budrys is professor emerita at DePaul University. She chaired the committee that created the Master of Public Health program and served as director for one year, directed the Public Services Master program, and was a professor in the Department of Sociology. Her books include Our Unsystematic Health Care System and How Nonprofits Work.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1—Introduction
Chapter 2—Identifying Disease and Its Causes
Chapter 3—Causes of Death
Chapter 4—Age, Sex, and Race or Ethnicity
Chapter 5—External Causes of Death
Chapter 6—Healthy and Unhealthy Behaviors: Diet
Chapter 7—Healthy and Unhealthy Behaviors: Exercise, Smoking, and Substance Abuse
Chapter 8—Health Care
Chapter 9—Genes
Chapter 10—Stress
Chapter 11—Social Determinants of Health
Chapter 12—Social Inequality
Chapter 13—Unequal Health

Editorial Reviews

Numerous primate species are hierarchical, where it can be a profound, existential drag to be low-ranking. But nothing rivals the human invention of socioeconomic status and inequality when it comes to subordinating the have-nots. It has long been recognized that these consequences include poor health. In this excellent, accessible new edition of Unequal Health, Budrys reviews the pathways mediating the social determinants of health. This is an important book, made even more so, I suspect, by the current political climate.

Robert Sapolsky

Health shows us how people are affected by the lives they lead. Learning about it gives us a window into how people experience society and its injustices. Grace Budrys is a guide you can trust: she understands her subject, writes simply and clearly, and tells it like it is. As you read this book, you will find she becomes a friend as well as a teacher. This book is a gift to us all.

Richard Wilkinson

Carefully researched, beautifully written, and accessible to most readers, Unequal Health is an indispensable book for anyone concerned about growing health inequities. The third edition provides a welcome update. Budrys addresses timely issues, such as the Affordable Care Act and its impact, along with long-standing concerns related to the social distribution of health behaviors and health care access that shape social variation in health outcomes.

Robyn Lewis Brown

Budrys's Unequal Health is a comprehensive text for students of the social determinants of health, whether they come from population studies, sociology, or social epidemiology. This edition draws on recent articles and reports from a wide range of publications to introduce students to the methods, theories, and relevant points of discourse. Additionally, this text is written in an engaging and readable style and will prove a useful tool for those who wish to understand unequal health in our world today.

Loretta E. Bass

Grace Budrys' s book Unequal Health is a perfect textbook on health disparities. The author explains difficult and complex concepts in a conversational and engaging style. The book contains a wealth of information on health disparities, and the presentation of research findings and academic discussions is easy to follow. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn about this very important public health issue.

Gesine Hearn

Praise for the first edition: Unequal Health provides an excellent opportunity for readers to begin critically to examine the complex relationship of various social categories and the ways that health is affected.....

Contemporary Sociology

Unequal Health could not have appeared at a more appropriate time. Inequality in health is arguably the most important public health issue confronting us today and yet, as we write, these inequalities are increasing rapidly. What causes the differences in health between older and younger people? Between men and women? Between Black people and White people? Are these differences inevitable? Are they the result of biology or of discrimination and oppression? These are the absolutely essential questions that Budrys fairly, directly, and eloquently discusses in her book.

Steven Whitman

Writing in a user-friendly style, Budrys offers a clear and simple explanation of the major factors contributing to the inequities, with the caveat that readers will be left with more questions than definitive answers. Recommended.

CHOICE

Writing in a user-friendly style, Budrys offers a clear and simple explanation of the major factors contributing to the inequities, with the caveat that readers will be left with more questions than definitive answers. Recommended.

Choice