Fifty essays on the state of population health from a vanguard voice in the fieldPublic health can rightly claim its share of victories: healthier cities, widespread sanitation, broader availability of nutrient-rich food, and reductions in violence and injury. But for all these gains, today we face a new set of challenges, ones complicated by political and professional shifts that threaten to fundamentally change the health of populations. Healthier is both an affirmation and an essential summary of the current challenges and opportunities for those working in and around the improvement of population health. The essays contained here champion an approach to health that is consequentialist and rooted in social justice -- an expansion of traditional, quantitatively motivated public health that will both inform and inspire any reader from student to seasoned practitioner. Galea's cogent, incisive arguments guarantee that his perspective, currently at the forefront of public health, will soon become conventional wisdom.
"Acknowledgements Dedication 1. Introduction Section 1. The foundations of population health 2. The aspirations and strategies of public health 3. Social justice, public health 4. On mechanisms vs. foundations 5. What health, for whom? 6. Pasteur's quadrant and population health 7. Producing health over a lifetime 8. Shaping values, elevating health 9. Towards a culture of health 10. Paternalism: unavoidable, perhaps desirable 11. At the heart of it all, empathy 12. On courage Section 2. The world as it is 13. More hate, more harm 14. The burden of incarceration 15. Finding a way out: suicide and the health of populations 16. The heavy toll of substance use 17. The health effects of war 18. Out in the cold 19. Priced out of health 20. When disaster strikes 21. Climate change and our health 22. Reproductive health, reproductive justice 23. Coming to terms with firearms 24. The corrosive role of racism Section 3. On inequities and the health of marginalized populations 25. On health haves and health have nots 26. Income and health 27. What Flint teaches us 28. Gender equity, almost 29. The well-being of LGBT populations 30. Transgender today 31. The health of immigrants 32. Caring for refugees Section 4. The challenges faced by public health 33. Population health science-are we doing it wrong? 34. To screen, or not to screen 35. Knowledge and values 36. A step backwards on vaccines 37. Living with complexity 38. Moving beyond ""lifestyle"" 39. On ignorance 40. Acknowledging luck Section 5. Towards a healthier world 41. Aging healthy 42. In the heart of the city, health 43. Towards an activist public health 44. Promoting prevention 45. Innovating for a healthier public 46. Who should we talk to, and how? 47. On engaging the media 48. Making the acceptable unacceptable 49. Social movements and the conditions of health 50. Public health as public good 51. A world without public health Index"
Sandro Galea, MD, DrPH, is the Robert A. Knox Professor and Dean at the School of Public Health at Boston University. A physician and epidemiologist interested in the social production of health of urban populations, his work explores innovative cells-to-society approaches to population health questions with an overall aim of advancing a consequentialist approach to population health scholarship. He is a past president of the Society for Epidemiologic Research and an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine. He is the author or editor of Epidemiology Matters, Population Health Science, and Systems Science and Population Health, all from Oxford University Press.
Reviews for Healthier: Fifty Thoughts on the Foundations of Population Health
The book everyone interested in health should read * Fortune *
