OVERVIEW
Established in June 2006 by Dr. Adewale Troutman, the Louisville Metro Department of Public Health and Wellness Director, The Center for Health Equity provides a new and hopeful approach to the public's health. Located in historical Hampton House in West Louisville, The Center for Health Equity works to address the root causes of health disparities by supporting projects, policies and research working to change the correlation between health and longevity and socioeconomic status. Further we recognize research that supports the fact that people of color face an additional burden. Solutions lie not in more pills or better genes, but in better social policies.
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Mission
The Center for Health Equity serves as a catalyst for collaboration between public health, communities and organizations that work to eliminate the social and economic barriers to good health. Through policy change, evidence-based interventions and education, the Center builds new coalitions that reshape the public health landscape to assist communities in addressing barriers to health equity. |
While drugs, diet, a healthy lifestyle, and medical technologies are important there is much more to our health than bad habits, health care or genes. The social conditions, into which we are born, live and work, profoundly affect our well-being and longevity. As Harvard epidemiologist David Williams points out, investing in our schools, improving housing, integrating neighborhoods, providing better jobs and wages, giving people more control over their work… these are as much health strategies as smoking, diet, and exercise.
KEY IDEAS
Health Inequalities or disparities are empirically evident differences that exist across different social groups in a society (Peter, 2000). Among all inequalities there exist a subset of disparities that are avoidable and therefore unfair or inequitable.
Health inequities are a subset of health inequalities or disparities involving circumstances that may be controlled by a policy, system, or institution so that the disparity is avoidable. These kinds of health disparities may include health and healthcare disparities. A society must use moral and ethical judgment to determine which inequalities are inequitable.
Social Justice is the fair distribution of society’s benefits, responsibilities and their consequences. It focuses on the relative position of one social group in relationship to others in society as well as on the root causes of disparities and what can be done to eliminate them.
For more information about the Center for Health Equity contact us at 502-574-6616.