Socio-economic determinants of health

Abstract

The high level of economic and demographic development of a country does not guarantee health equality to its citizens. Health differentiation is associated not only with genetic, behavioral, or infrastructural factors, despite their significance; it reflects also the socio-economic differentiation of society. Thus, the concept of social determinants of health arises — the of people from their birth to the old age. The World Health Organization defines health as a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, but not only as the absence of disease and physical defects. This definition, however, does not allow emphasizing that set of objective indicators through which one can monitor and measure health. At present, there is no unique comparable scale for determining the level of health; its development requires a complex interdisciplinary study. This article studies the concept and defines the classification of socio-economic determinants of the population’s health. Using a variety of contemporary foreign studies linking specific indicators of health or life expectancy with a number of social determinants, the current paper reveals the nature of the socio-economic factors influence on the health of the population. Due to the lack of Russian research on the topic, this article is of interest to the Russian audience with a broad overview of theoretical and empirical works.