The Wellesley Institute researches and analyzes the policy changes needed to address the social determinants of health that underlie pervasive and damaging health inequities. Last week Bob Gardner and Steve Barnes spoke to a group of CIHR fellows about driving health equity strategies into action. Bob spoke about acting on health equity within the health system by:
- building equity into all planning and delivery
- targeting some programs and resources for equity impact
- aligning equity with key system drivers
- embedding equity in performance management and service delivery
Bob went on to discuss how to embed health equity beyond healthcare – tackling the underlying roots of health inequality in the wider social determinants of health:
- through community-based innovation, cross-sectoral collaborations and fundamental social and policy change to reduce inequality
- community and political mobilization to demand and drive the necessary policy changes
All of this needs good planning, and we spoke of the potential of Health Equity Impact Assessment (HEIA). Steve gave an example of using HEIA to drive policy change outside of the health setting. He spoke about the Wellesley Institute’s The Real Cost of City Cuts – a health equity impact assessment that identified possible effects of cuts in municipal programs and services. He went on to highlight challenges planners and policy makers face in evaluating the impact of using equity-focused tools.
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