There are some tremendous innovations underway across the public health field on addressing social determinants and health inequities in their communities. I believe public health is one of the most important mechanisms to drive health equity into action across the province and country. I had the pleasure of doing two half-day workshops with Windsor-Essex County […]
Overview: Key Challenges Facing The LHINs
Dr. Bob Gardner identifies some lynch-pin issues that offer the opportunities for making significant reforms and improvements to the way health is delivered. While issues are separated out and grouped, in practice, many will be inter-dependent.
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Building Equity In: Hospital Planning And Service Delivery
Hospitals are a vital part of the health care system. Some hospitals have developed equity plans and made strong commitments to meeting the needs of health disadvantaged populations, and ensuring equitable access and quality in their services and within their organizations; others less so. This is a short briefing note on pressures hospitals will be […]
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Equitable Access To Good Health And Health Care For Uninsured Residents
On April 29, I had the opportunity to present to the Toronto Board of Health recommendations and policy changes needed to ensure equitable access to good health and health care for all in Toronto, including our most marginalized populations such as the uninsured. Uninsured populations currently face serious and damaging barriers to good health and […]
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Recommendations for specific amendments to Bill 36 on LHINs
Rick Blickstead and I presented a brief to the Standing Committee on Social Policy of the Ontario Legislature January 30 on the LHINs (Local Health Integration Networks). We argued that the LHINs had significant potential to provide more integrated and community-driven health care planning and delivery. But this will only be possible if they: are […]
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Congratulations to Fife House
Congratulations to Fife House who have received a US$ 500,000 grant from the MAC AIDS Fund to expand their innovative transitional housing programme for people living with HIV/AIDS. We were pleased to have funded previous research that Fife House and other partners have been able to leverage so well into research and programme development that […]
Closing the Gap
The European Commission has initiated a major project ” Closing the Gap: Strategies for Action to Tackle Health Inequalities ” to address health disparities. They have created a European Health Inequalities Portal with links to relevant agencies and networks, a database of best practices and country specific data on polices and programs. Among their very […]
Race & Health Disparaties in the U.S.
Kate Meyers of the Kaiser Permanent Institute for Health Policy has done a comprehensive and insightful review of the research literature on race and health disparities in the US. The goal of her paper is to help develop a clear conceptual and multi-sectoral analytical framework to understand disparities and a platform from which better policy […]
Blueprint for Health Equity
I am making a speech on a Blueprint for Health Equity at the Canadian Federation of Nurses Union conference in Moncton in August. I will highlight pervasive health disparities, detail key components of an integrated and comprehensive policy framework to enhance health equity, and set out some ideas on how to mobilize to win the […]
The Last Straw! A Board Game on the Social Determinants of Health
The Last Straw! A Board Game on the Social Determinants of Health, co-funded by the Wellesley Institute, is a fun way for players to learn how the daily life cycles and social conditions of individuals and communities can affect health and illness – think ‘Monopoly’ with social conscience and analysis. The Last Straw! shows how […]
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