Beyond Health Care — Socioeconomic Status and Health

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Abstract
The article by Mackenbach et al. in this issue of the Journal 1 documents the extraordinary pervasiveness of socioeconomic inequalities in health as well as the varying magnitude of risks among countries. The compilation of data from western and eastern European countries on mortality, morbidity, smoking, and obesity in relation to socioeconomic status allows the authors to provide the broadest international portrait to date of the association between socioeconomic status and health. The link between socioeconomic disadvantage and poor health has been observed repeatedly,2 but until now we have lacked data that would permit us to make consistent comparisons of these linkages across many countries. Comparisons among countries invite us to examine the features that are shared from country to country that contribute to the overall patterns of disease, as well as to explore the unique features of a nation that contribute to variability in the magnitude of the risks across countries. Mackenbach et al. provide us with a comparative inter-country study that harmonizes data and analytic approaches, allowing reasonable comparisons. The results are provocative for what they tell us, as well as for what they do not tell us.