Empowerment & Health. Evidence.

WHO/Europe - Health Evidence Netw... - Summary: "Within the last decades, social exclusion, disparities, and absolute poverty - almost 3 billion people living on less than US $2.00 per day - have grown despite globalization and rising per-capita income in many developing nations. Income ratios of the richest 20% of the population to the poorest 20% are now at 82 to 1 compared to 30 to 1 in 1960. World-wide health disparities are increasing due to vulnerability to disease from severe malnutrition, rapid re-emergence of water and blood-borne infectious diseases, environmental degradation, disinvestment in the health infrastructure and violence. Within this same period, empowerment strategies, participation, and other bottom-up approaches have become prominent paradigms within public health and the development aid for reducing these disparities. As 'empowerment' increasingly enters mainstream discourse, those using the term need to clarify definitions, dimensions and outcomes of the range of interventions called empowering."/.../