Facing health inequalities. A European perspective

From the introduction

Health (re)constructs social diversification on both the material and economic level as well as on the social, cultural, political and territorial ones. What is more, it is one of the most important dimensions of personal and social identities. It should not be surprising as it is through health that people express their social belonging and identification, the preferred system of values and lifestyle. As a consequence, health and illness in their mutual relation have also become one of the basic dimensions of social diversification, (we - the Healthy and they - the ill) marginalization, discrimination and oppression. Because of this, it is also important to pay attention to the global dimensions of health inequalities as modernization and globalization enhance the disproportions both on the local and the global scale (...) issues such as health and social inequalities are important for both E.U. policy and education (...).

Those issues were undertaken by researchers from various countries during the 8th International Summer School on Health Inequalities which took place at Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poland, 7th-11th of June 2010 (...)

It is a great pleasure to introduce this publication, which is the result of cooperation between professors, researchers and students from Poland, Germany, Romania, the Netherlands, Spain and Turkey (...) We hope that the articles presented in this monograph will be an opportunity for further reflexion and investigation in the field of health promotion, medical and social sciences.