DEPP working paper

This Working Paper is part of the Development Economics and Public Policy series

Health, Health Care, Poverty and Well Being: An Overview for a Developing Country Focus

David Hulme and David Lawson

Abstract

The importance of the linkages between poverty and ill health has long been recognised. Despite this, much research on these issues fails to explore the linkages. Health specialists focus on the proximate determinants of health and disease with little attention to distal determinants (income poverty, inequality, vulnerability). Economists and social scientists focus on economic and social variables, often treating ill health as an idiosyncratic factor rather than a central analytical component. In this paper we review conceptualisations and empirical materials on poverty-ill health interactions, relating this to the current debates in the field of health and poverty, provide an overview of the papers in this collection and draw out a number of conclusions

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