Health Status

Background: Globally, there are more than 150 million international migrant workers—individuals who are employed outside of their country of origin—comprising the largest international migrant group. A substantial number of migrants work in hazardous and exploitative environments, where they might be at considerable risk of injury and ill health. However, little data on occupational health outcomes of migrant workers exist, with which to inform global policy making and delivery of health services.
Referred to as the ‘forgotten causalities’ of climate change (Cutter 1995), very few studies have examined the precise nature and magnitude of climate change impacts on children, let alone on the growing number of orphans and vulnerable children in Sub-Sahara Africa (SSA), where climate change is already expected to exact its worst humanitarian toll. This paper examines personal, familial, and contextual circumstances that arise when children lose their parents to HIV/AIDS and how these situations mediate exposure to the impacts of climate-related disasters.
In the first paper in this Series we assessed theoretical and empirical evidence and concluded that the health of people living in slums is a function not only of poverty but of intimately shared physical and social environments. In this paper we extend the theory of so-called neighbourhood effects. Slums offer high returns on investment because beneficial effects are shared across many people in densely populated neighbourhoods. Neighbourhood effects also help explain how and why the benefits of interventions vary between slum and non-slum spaces and between slums.
Background In September, 2015, the UN General Assembly established the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs specify 17 universal goals, 169 targets, and 230 indicators leading up to 2030. We provide an analysis of 33 health-related SDG indicators based on the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2015 (GBD 2015). Methods We applied statistical methods to systematically compiled data to estimate the performance of 33 health-related SDG indicators for 188 countries from 1990 to 2015.
Elsevier, Social Science and Medicine, Volume 167, 1 October 2016
Energy insecurity is a multi-dimensional construct that describes the interplay between physical conditions of housing, household energy expenditures and energy-related coping strategies. The present study uses an adapted grounded theory approach based on in-depth interviews with 72 low-income families to advance the concept of energy insecurity. Study results illustrate the layered components of energy insecurity by providing rich and nuanced narratives of the lived experiences of affected households.
In this paper we examine the social and legal conditions in which many transgender people (often called trans people) live, and the medical perspectives that frame the provision of health care for transgender people across much of the world. Modern research shows much higher numbers of transgender people than were apparent in earlier clinic-based studies, as well as biological factors associated with gender incongruence. We examine research showing that many transgender people live on the margins of society, facing stigma, discrimination, exclusion, violence, and poor health.
Background One of the most important consequences of climate change could be its effects on agriculture. Although much research has focused on questions of food security, less has been devoted to assessing the wider health impacts of future changes in agricultural production. In this modelling study, we estimate excess mortality attributable to agriculturally mediated changes in dietary and weight-related risk factors by cause of death for 155 world regions in the year 2050.
This paper extends the concept of therapeutic landscapes by investigating how green and blue spaces affect older adult health and wellbeing. We draw on interview data from participants aged 65-86 years old who described their everyday experiences with green and especially blue spaces across Metro Vancouver, Canada. Landscapes embedded with therapeutic qualities included parks, gardens, street greenery, lakes, and the ocean. Interactions with these spaces influenced participants' perceived physical, mental, and social health.

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