Chapter 19. The Sociology of the Body: Health and Medicine
Chapter 19. The Sociology of the Body: Health and Medicine
19.3 Health in Canada
Health in Canada is a complex and often contradictory issue. On the one hand, as one of the wealthiest nations, Canada fares well in health outcomes with respect to the rest of the world. The publicly funded health care system in Canada also compares well to the noted issues of the private for-profit system in the United States (especially in terms of overall cost and who gets access to medical care). On the other hand, it is also behind many European countries in terms of key health care indicators such as access to family doctors and wait times for critical procedures. Choices about the model for delivering health care are one of the key variables affecting people’s health in a society.
The following sections look at different social determinants of health in Canada. The social determinants of health model emphasizes that social variables influence health outcomes for individuals and populations. Health and illness are not randomly distributed in a society. Their occurrence and prevalence are linked to the social organization of the society, particularly in terms of social inequality.
Social variables including race and ethnicity, gender, early childhood experiences, education, employment and working conditions, housing, income, social security policies, and access to health care produce different consequences for individual health. These variables impact health by affecting life chances, lifestyles, and life experiences. Social inequality determines who has access to resources such as adequate nutrition, satisfying work, recreation, and housing. As Navarro et al. (2004) argue, “a society’s socio-economic, political, and cultural variables are the most important factors in explaining the level of population health.”
Health by Race and Ethnicity
Unlike the United States, where strong health disparities exist along racial lines, differences in Canadians’ health between non-Indigenous visible minorities and Canadians of European origin disappear once socioeconomic status and lifestyle are taken into account. Moreover, new and recent immigrants from non-European countries tend to have better health than the average native-born Canadian (Kobayashi, Prus, and Lin, 2008).
Indigenous Canadians unfortunately continue to suffer disproportionately from serious health problems.
It is estimated that in the 1500s, prior to contact, there were 500,000 Indigenous people living in Canada, although estimates range from 200,000 to 2,000,000 (O’Donnell, 2008). Through epidemics of contagious Euro-Asian diseases such as smallpox, measles, influenza, and tuberculosis, Indigenous populations suffered an estimated 93% decline.
Conditions in the late 19th century to the mid-20th century did not improve markedly after Indigenous people were moved to reserves. Often lacking adequate drinking water, sanitation facilities, and hygienic conditions, these were ideal settings for the spread of co