- Location
- Medical Sciences Building, 1 King's College Circle, Room 3278
- Dates
- March 27, 2019 from 4:10pm to 5:30pm
Links
The University of Toronto Joint Centre for Bioethics presents the 7th Annual Ross Upshur Lecture on Public Health Ethics
“Social Injustice Is Killing People on a Grand Scale”: Reorienting Action on Social Determinants Toward Social Justice
Andrew Pinto, MD, CCFP, FRCPC, MSc, Director, Upstream Lab, Centre for Urban Health Solutions, Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute, St. Michael’s Hospital, Clinician-Scientist, Department of Family and Community Medicine, St. Michael’s Hospital, Assistant Professor, Department of Family and Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine & Division of Clinical Public Health and Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation, Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto
A decade ago the WHO released the final report of the Commission on the Social Determinants of Health, calling for urgent action on social injustice. As evidence accumulated that social factors are key to access to health services, health care costs and health outcomes, many organizations called for action on social determinants. However, most interventions have focused narrowly on meeting immediate social needs of individuals rather than broader injustice. In this lecture, we will explore how actions to address social determinants have been fit within a biomedical model, often without involving public health. We will also discuss why this should have been anticipated. We will examine why taking a social justice approach – at micro, meso and macro levels – would improve the effectiveness of interventions within health care and public health that aim to address the social determinants.
This lecture is free and open to the public. It will also be webcast.