November 2007, Volume 18, Issue 6
EPIDEMIOLOGY - peer-reviewed scientific journal
Epidemiology participated in the Global Theme
Issue on Poverty and Human Development; see the November 2007 issue
URL: : http://www.councilscienceeditors.org/globalthemeissue.cfm
This was an international collaboration of 235 journals from developed and developing countries.
These 235 journals from 37 countries are publishing more than 750 articles on poverty and human development (see below for the list of participating journals and articles). The journals and the articles represent all regions of the world and specifically include the following 87 countries: Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belgium, Brazil, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cuba, Democratic Republic of Congo, Djibouti, Dominican Republic, Egypt, El Salvador, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Fiji, France, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Germany, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Laos, Lebanon, Madagascar, Malaysia, Malawi, Mali, Mexico, Moldova, Mongolia, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Palestine, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Portugal, Russia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Somalia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Sudan, Taiwan, Tanzania, Thailand, Turkey, Uganda, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Venezuela, Vietnam, Zambia, Zimbabwe.
Please direct any questions or requests for additional information to the attention of Annette Flanagin at annette.flanagin@jama-archives.org.
Content of Epidemiology special Issue: November 2007, Volume 18, Issue 6
| The Millennium Development Goals: A Challenge to Epidemiologists Margaret F. McCann |
| Why Epidemiologists Cannot Afford to Ignore Poverty. Nancy Krieger Epidemiologists cannot afford to ignore poverty. To do so would, first, wrongly obscure the devastating impact of poverty on population health, and, second, undercut our commitment to scientific rigor. At issue is doing correct science, not "politically correct" science. Blot poverty and inequity from view, and not only will we contribute to making suffering invisible but our understanding of disease etiology and distribution will be marred. To make this case, I address current debates about the causal relationships between poverty and health, and provide examples of how failing to consider the impact of socioeconomic position has biased epidemiologic knowledge and harmed the public's health. By definition, the people we study are simultaneously social beings and biologic organisms-and we cannot study the latter without taking into account the former. It is the responsibility of all epidemiologists, and not only social epidemiologists, to keep in mind the connections between poverty and health. |
| Poverty, Environment, and Health: The Role of Environmental Epidemiology and Environmental Epidemiologists. Marie S. O'Neill; Anthony J. McMichael; Joel Schwartz; Daniel Wartenberg International attention is focusing increasingly on environmental concerns, from global warming and extreme weather to persistent chemical pollutants that affect our food supplies, health and well-being. These environmental exposures disproportionately affect the poor and those residing in developing countries, and may partly explain the persistent social gradients in health that exist within and between nations. We support recent calls for environmental epidemiologists to play a more active role in furthering the global agenda for sustainability, environmental health and equity. We further suggest that the discipline of environmental epidemiology, as well as relevant funding agencies, broaden their focus to include rigorous research on the upstream, larger-scale societal factors that contribute to inequitable patterns of exposure and health outcomes. By widening the scope of our vision and increasing the strength and breadth of the evidence base about how poverty and environment together affect health, we can better participate in efforts to promote social justice and responsible use and protection of the environment, and thus reduce health inequities. That is both a primary mode and rationale for achieving sustainability. |
| Measuring Progress Towards Equitable Child Survival: Where are the Epidemiologists? Cesar G. Victora The fourth Millennium Development Goal (MDG) is to achieve a two-thirds reduction in the mortality of under the age of 5 years children between 1990 and 2015. Only 7 of the 60 priority countries are currently on track towards the goal, and intensified efforts are required both globally and nationally. Tackling inequities is essential for reaching this goal, because children from poor families are consistently at higher risk of dying. Efforts should be concentrated on achieving high and equitable coverage with low-cost, effective, off-the-shelf interventions, and on monitoring progress among different social groups. Measuring inequities in mortality, morbidity, nutritional status, and coverage, however, is fraught with methodologic difficulties in countries where routine statistics are unreliable-a group that includes all high-mortality countries. Key methodologic challenges are discussed, with arguments for greater involvement of epidemiologists in measurement exercise that so far has been led by demographers, statisticians, and economists. |
| Armed Conflict and Poverty in Paula E. Brentlinger; Miguel A. Hernán Several armed conflicts took place in |
| Depressive Symptoms in Low-Income Women in Rural Nancy L. Fleischer; Lia C. Fernald; Alan E. Hubbard This paper reports a cross-sectional analysis of demographic, socioeconomic, physical, and psychosocial factors associated with depressive symptoms among poor women in rural |
| Air Pollution, Social Deprivation, and Mortality: A Multilevel Cohort Study. Øyvind Næss; Fredrik N. Piro; Per Nafstad; George Davey Smith; Alastair H. Leyland “…..is becoming increasingly evident that exposure to air pollution and its adverse effects are not equitably distributed. Our goal was to investigate the role of social deprivation in explaining the effect of neighborhood differences in level of air pollution fine particulates (PM2.5) on mortality when the indicators of social deprivation are measured at both individual level and at neighborhood level….” |
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