University of Glasgow - Schools - School of Health & Wellbeing - Research - MRC/CSO Social and Public Health Sciences Unit - Research

Inequalities in Health

Our Inequalities in Health programme works to reduce health inequalities, with a particular focus on health inequalities between different social groups. Health inequalities in the UK were highlighted in the Black Report in 1980. Despite moving near the top of the health agenda since then, inequalities have persisted or increased across Western Europe and elsewhere.

In this programme we produce important methodological development and emphasise improving understanding of the causes of inequality to inform policy or other intervention strategies, largely using observational and survey data. The programme is presented in four workstreams. “Measuring inequalities”, “Understanding inequalities”, “Reducing inequalities”, and “Inequalities in the workplace”.

Together, these workstreams provide a progression of health inequalities research: describing the problem, understanding the causes, and establishing what works to reduce inequalities in population and workplace settings in the UK and internationally.

Our objectives are to:

Improve population health and reduce inequalities through research that advances understanding of the determinants of health and health inequalities.
Inform and evaluate policy and large-scale interventions that will reduce health inequalities through the conduct and translation of research.
Exploit and enhance routine, linked and population-sampled data sources, maximising the return on the investment made in these resources and the underlying infrastructure.
Develop and build capacity in methods for measuring, understanding and reducing inequalities in health using observational data.