"A groundbreaking approach to critical epidemiology for understanding the complexity of the health process and studying the social determination of health. A powerful critique of Cartesian health sciences, of the flaws of "functional health determinants" model, and of reductionist approaches to health statistics, qualitative research and conventional health geography. A consolidated and well sustained essay that explains the role of social-gender-ethnic relations in the reproduction of health inequity, proposing a new paradigm with indispensible concepts and methodological means to develop a new understanding of health as a socially determined and distributed process. It combines the strengths of scientific traditions of the North and South, to bring forward a new understanding and application of qualitative and quantitative (statistical) evidences, that looks beyond the limits of conventional epidemiology, public and population health. The book presents alternative conceptions and tools for constructing deep prevention. A neo-humanist conception of the role of health and life sciences that assumes critical, intercultural and transdisciplinary thinking as a fundamental tool beyond the limiting elitist framework of positivist reasoning. A most important source of fresh ideas and practical instruments for teaching, research and agency, based on a renewed conception of the relation between nature, society, health and environmental problems"--

This concise, conceptually rich, and accessible book is a rallying cry for a return to the study and discussion of epidemiologic theory: what it is, why it matters, how it has changed over time, and its implications for improving population health and promoting health equity. By tracing its history and contours from ancient societies on through the development of--and debates within--contemporary epidemiology worldwide, Dr. Krieger shows how epidemiologic theory has long shaped epidemiologic practice, knowledge, and the politics of public health.

From Embodying Injustice to Embodying Equity: Embodied Truths and the Ecosocial Theory of Disease Distribution -- Embodying (In)justice and Embodied Truths: Using Ecosocial Theory to Analyze Population Health Data -- Challenges: Embodied Truths, Vision, and Advancing Health Justice.

A social epidemiologist looks at health inequalities in terms of the upstream factors that produced them. A political sociologist sees these same inequalities as products of institutions that unequally allocate power and social goods. Neither is wrong -- but can the two talk to one another? In a stirring new synthesis, Political Sociology and the People's Health advances the debate over social inequalities in health by offering a new set of provocative hypotheses around how health is distributed in and across populations. It joins political sociology's macroscopic insights into social policy, labor markets, and the racialized and gendered state with social epidemiology's conceptualizations and measurements of populations, etiologic periods, and distributions. The result is a major leap forward in how we understand the relationships between institutions and inequalities -- and essential reading for those in public health, sociology, and beyond.

This book shows the important links between social conditions and health and begins to describe the processes through which these health inequalities may be generated. It reviews a range of methodologies that could be used by health researchers in this field and proposes innovative future research directions.

In the United States, some populations suffer from far greater disparities in health than others. Those disparities are caused not only by fundamental differences in health status across segments of the population, but also because of inequities in factors that impact health status, so-called determinants of health. Only part of an individual's health status depends on his or her behavior and choice; community-wide problems like poverty, unemployment, poor education, inadequate housing, poor public transportation, interpersonal violence, and decaying neighborhoods also contribute to health inequities, as well as the historic and ongoing interplay of structures, policies, and norms that shape lives. When these factors are not optimal in a community, it does not mean they are intractable: such inequities can be mitigated by social policies that can shape health in powerful ways. Communities in Action: Pathways to Health Equity seeks to delineate the causes of and the solutions to health inequities in the United States. This report focuses on what communities can do to promote health equity, what actions are needed by the many and varied stakeholders that are part of communities or support them, as well as the root causes and structural barriers that need to be overcome.

First edition published in 2002. Second edition published in 2008.

The media constantly bombard us with news of health hazards lurking in our everyday lives, but many of these hazards turn out to have been greatly overblown. According to author and epidemiologist Geoffrey C. Kabat, this hyping of low-level environmental hazards leads to needless anxiety and confusion on the part of the public concerning which exposures have important effects on health and which are likely to have minimal or no effect. Kabat approaches health scares as "social facts" and shows that a variety of factors can contribute to the inflating of a hazard. These include skewed reporting by the media, but also, surprisingly, the actions of researchers who may emphasize certain findings while ignoring others; regulatory and health agencies eager to show their responsiveness to the health concerns of the public; and politicians and advocates with a stake in a particular outcome. By means of four case studies, Kabat demonstrates how a powerful confluence of interests can lead to overstating or distorting the scientific evidence. He considers the health risks of pollutants such as DDT as a cause of breast cancer, electromagnetic fields from power lines, radon within residences, and secondhand tobacco smoke. Tracing the trajectory of each of these hazards from its initial emergence to the present, Kabat shows how publication of more rigorous studies and critical assessments ultimately help put hazards in perspective.

Sixth edition of the hugely successful, internationally recognised textbook on global public health and epidemiology, with 3 volumes comprehensively covering the scope, methods, and practice of the discipline

"The Nation has lost sight of its public health goals and has allowed the system of public health to fall into 'disarray'," from The Future of Public Health. This startling book contains proposals for ensuring that public health service programs are efficient and effective enough to deal not only with the topics of today, but also with those of tomorrow. In addition, the authors make recommendations for core functions in public health assessment, policy development, and service assurances, and identify the level of government--federal, state, and local--at which these functions would best be handled.