Lecture 5: Risk/vulnerability and health

Question 1

How are places related to disease diffusion?

Answer 1

Vectors
Structural factors
Co-occurrence of particular diseases
Concentrations of doctors/hospitals

Question 2

Health Geography thinks about place in broader terms

Answer 2

How place influences health (not just illness)

How characteristics of individuals/pops. intersect

Question 3

Social Determinants of Health

Answer 3

Place:
Age
Location
Gender
Environmental factors
SES
Health outcomes
Ethnoracial background
Sex

Question 4

A Health Geog. Approach

Three key themes”

Answer 4

Places matter: a variety of factors convene within place; different groups of people experience health differently

Social theory is relevant: People are not just ‘cases’ or ‘observations’ to be counted, but actors who are influenced by social and political factors. They can choose certain health behaviours or be constrained/coerced into others (i.e., Foucault’s governmentality). Inequalities happen for political/historical reasons.

Critical: Imperative to explain and change what is wrong, not just describe it (how do we limit HIV risk among gay men?)

Question 5

The small province ‘powder keg’:

Answer 5

Structural/environmental issues different from ‘MTV’ cities

Signals need to increase supports for overall well-being of gay men as a means of STI/HIV prevention

‘High’ and ‘low’ prevalence places do not exist in vacuums

Availability/mobility of sexual relationships + risk behaviours increasing universally; but structural differences in services/education

Question 6

Conclusions

Answer 6

An ‘ecological’ approach reveals risk and vulnerabilities where positivist ones might not

Need to beware of seeing HIV risk as only associated with particular groups or places—always a combination, intersects with life events

Also intersects with health infrastructures that are products of local societies and cultures