Public health. Social context and action

Health is determined by the conditions in which we live our everyday lives. Those conditions include the social, cultural, economic, educational, and occupational as well as the physical and mental environment, which influence health behaviour and lifestyle and so the health status. Disparities in those determinants between social groups lead to inequalities in health. Those issues are contents of the book 'Public Health. Social context and action.' Knowledge of such social determinants of health, both, on individual level as well as on the level of communities is crucial to health planning. Thus, the contents of this book are of great importance for persons who are engaged and interested in integrated care issues. The book is written by 23 different authors, mainly from the UK. The book consists of two introductory chapters and after that of two main parts, each part with eight sub-chapters. Thus, the book comprises 18 separately authored chapters, part 1 is titled as 'the social context of public health', and part 2 as 'public health action'. The first chapter of the book gives an outlook on the contents of the two main parts of the book and summarizes each chapter. Additionally, the main messages and conclusions of the chapters that will follow are highlighted in a key deduction section. In the second introductory chapter a historical overview of public health in the UK is given. In some points reference is made to the US or Europe. The chapter also provides the readers with an overview of the current public health agenda in the UK. The first main part of the book, which comprises chapters 3–10, gives a theoretical overview of the impact of socioeconomic variables on individual and population health. In these chapters a comprehensive diversity of potential influencing factors on the health status is presented. In chapter 3 the socio-political context of public health is reflected. Demographic aspects like mortality, fertility, migration and trends for these demographic patterns in Great Britain are presented and their public health impacts, such as changes in disease frequency (epidemiological transition), are discussed. In the next chapter a model for the interactions between social determinants, health behaviour, and health inequalities is presented and the consequences for health policies discussed. The association between socioeconomic variables and health is illustrated by figures of life expectancy by occupational class in Eng-land and Wales. The following chapter deals with the relationship between job characteristics and …