Public health and social justice: Forging the links

South African Journal of Bioethics and Law 8 (2):26 (2015)
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Abstract

The purpose of this article is to explore the concept and scope of public health and to argue that particularly in low-income contexts, where social injustice and poverty often impact significantly on the overall health of the population, the link between public health and social justice should be a very firm one. Furthermore, social justice in these contexts must be understood as not simply a matter for local communities and nation-states, but in so far as public health is concerned, as a matter of global concern and responsibility. The interpretation of the scope of public health by any particular nation is I believe contingent on the current socio-political context and the conception of social or distributive justice that underpins this context. Furthermore I will argue here that the link between public health and social justice ought to be founded on a conception of social justice that adequately addresses issues of social injustice, and patterns of systematic disadvantage, that contribute to ill health and that so commonly prevail in many low- and middle-income social contexts.

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Lyn Horn
University of Stellenbosch

Citations of this work

The 2016 CIOMS guidelines and publichealth research ethics.J. R. Williams - 2017 - South African Journal of Bioethics and Law 10 (2):93-95.
Public health, beneficence and cosmopolitan justice.L. Horn - 2015 - South African Journal of Bioethics and Law 8 (2):30.

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References found in this work

Justice beyond borders: a global political theory.Simon Caney - 2005 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Justice and international relations.Charles R. Beitz - 1975 - Philosophy and Public Affairs 4 (4):360-389.
Rethinking the Meaning of Public Health.Mark A. Rothstein - 2002 - Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics 30 (2):144-149.

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