Responding to the global challenge of sick societies
This chapter takes a reflective view, looking at our societies' current and future health as a mirror that reveals who we are and who we are becoming. It argues that looking into the mirror, we see unhealthy societies, and a model of development that threatens human welfare. Looking beyond the mirror, we can imagine a more egalitarian world where reducing human suffering — be it chronic or infectious — is the principal objective of social policy. While this approach may seem novel and untried, in medicine it traces back to an historical era of the 19th century, where drugs were ineffective but the public health community was nevertheless able to greatly reduce suffering due to infectious diseases.
Keywords: public health, unhealthy societies, economic development, human welfare, social policy
Oxford Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us .