ABSTRACT
Evidence derived from a wide range of social settings and using a variety of epidemiological methods has established a convincing association between socioeconomic circumstances and health status. It is part of the conventional wisdom that socioeconomic deprivation is associated with demonstrable “ill-health” in affected individuals and groups, such ill-health being manifested in high levels of morbidity and, perhaps most convincingly, in high levels of mortality. And it is also part of conventional social idealism, expressed in the declaration of Alma Ata and accepted with enthusiasm by both the central office of the World Health Organization in Geneva and its regional branches, that an important objective in the health field is to reduce these socially related inequalities in health experience. Although it is convenient for descriptive purposes to distinguish between socioeconomic and medical measures, they overlap to some extent, and they both consume financial and human resources.
