International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai, India.
J Biosoc Sci. 2013 Mar;45(2):167-85. doi: 10.1017/S0021932012000211. Epub 2012 May 29.
As India rapidly urbanizes, within urban areas socioeconomic disparities are rising and health inequality among urban children is an emerging challenge. This paper assesses the relative contribution of socioeconomic factors to child health inequalities between the less developed Empowered Action Group (EAG) states and more developed South Indian states in urban India using data from the 2005-06 National Family Health Survey. Focusing on urban health from varying regional and developmental contexts, socioeconomic inequalities in child health are examined first using Concentration Indices (CIs) and then the contributions of socioeconomic factors to the CIs of health variables are derived. The results reveal, in order of importance, pronounced contributions of household economic status, parent's illiteracy and caste to urban child health inequalities in the South Indian states. In contrast, parent's illiteracy, poor economic status, being Muslim and child birth order 3 or more are major contributors to health inequalities among urban children in the EAG states. The results suggest the need to adopt different health policy interventions in accordance with the pattern of varying contributions of socioeconomic factors to child health inequalities between the more developed South Indian states and less developed EAG states.
随着印度快速城市化，城市内部的社会经济差距不断扩大，城市儿童的健康不平等问题成为新的挑战。本文利用 2005-2006 年全国家庭健康调查的数据，评估了社会经济因素对印度城市中欠发达的赋权行动集团（EAG）各州和较发达的南印度各州儿童健康不平等的相对贡献。本文从不同的区域和发展背景出发，关注城市健康问题，首先使用集中指数（CIs）来评估儿童健康方面的社会经济不平等，然后推导出社会经济因素对健康变量 CIs 的贡献。结果表明，在南印度各州，家庭经济状况、父母文盲和种姓对城市儿童健康不平等的影响最为显著。相比之下，在 EAG 各州，父母文盲、经济贫困、穆斯林和第 3 个及以上孩子的出生顺序是造成城市儿童健康不平等的主要因素。结果表明，需要根据较发达的南印度各州和欠发达的 EAG 各州之间社会经济因素对儿童健康不平等的不同贡献模式，采取不同的卫生政策干预措施。
