Health inequality: what does it mean and how can we measure it?

How health inequality affect responses to the COVID-19 pandemic in Sub-Saharan Africa

The COVID-19 outbreak has infected millions of people across the world, caused hundreds of thousands of deaths, and collapsed national economies. Recognizing the importance of handwashing in preventing the spread of COVID-19, concerns have arisen about the condition of millions of Africans who lack access to hygiene facilities and clean water services. This paper compiles evidence from the WHO-UNICEF data to show the health disparities that limit the capacity of African countries to effectively address the COVID-19 disease along with recommendations for addressing the challenge.

Development of the Migrant Friendly Maternity Care Questionnaire (MFMCQ) for migrants to Western societies: an international Delphi consensus process

Background

Through the World Health Assembly Resolution, ‘Health of Migrants’, the international community has identified migrant health as a priority. Recommendations for general hospital care for international migrants in receiving-countries have been put forward by the Migrant Friendly Hospital Initiative; adaptations of these recommendations specific to maternity care have yet to be elucidated and validated. We aimed to develop a questionnaire measuring migrant-friendly maternity care (MFMC) which could be used in a range of maternity care settings and countries.

Methods

This study was conducted in four stages. First, questions related to migrant friendly maternity care were identified from existing questionnaires including the Migrant Friendliness Quality Questionnaire, developed in Europe to capture recommended general hospital care for migrants, and the Mothers In a New Country (MINC) Questionnaire, developed in Australia and revised for use in Canada to capture the maternity care experiences of migrant women, and combined to create an initial MFMC questionnaire. Second, a Delphi consensus process in three rounds with a panel of 89 experts in perinatal health and migration from 17 countries was undertaken to identify priority themes and questions as well as to clarify wording and format. Third, the draft questionnaire was translated from English to French and Spanish and back-translated and subsequently culturally validated (assessed for cultural appropriateness) by migrant women. Fourth, the questionnaire was piloted with migrant women who had recently given birth in Montreal, Canada.

Results

A 112-item questionnaire on maternity care from pregnancy, through labour and birth, to postpartum care, and including items on maternal socio-demographic, migration and obstetrical characteristics, and perceptions of care, has been created - the Migrant Friendly Maternity Care Questionnaire (MFMCQ) – in three languages (English, French and Spanish). It is completed in 45 minutes via interview administration several months post-birth.

Conclusions

A 4-stage process of questionnaire development with international experts in migrant reproductive health and research resulted in the MFMCQ, a questionnaire measuring key aspects of migrant-sensitive maternity care. The MFMCQ is available for further translation and use to examine and compare care and perceptions of care within and across countries, and by key socio-demographic, migration, and obstetrical characteristics of migrant women.

[Evolution of socioeconomic inequalities in infant and child mortality in Brazil, 1993-20]

In Brazil, infant and child mortality reveal a downward trend. Few studies have investigated the temporal trends in the inequalities of these deaths, at individual level, according to socio-economic status. The scope of this article was to investigate the temporal trends of the magnitude of inequalities in infant and child mortality, between groups defined by maternal education and household income per capita in the 1993-2008 period in Brazil. Microdata from the National Household Sample Survey were used. The inequality measure was the concentration index (CI). It was calculated for infant and child deaths, according to maternal education and household income per capita. During the 2003-2008 period, there was a reduction in inequalities in infant and child mortality, at individual level, and according to maternal education and household income per capita. In 2008, the concentration of child deaths among children whose mothers had less education was higher than the concentration of infant deaths. The CI according to income had greater variability, but also demonstrated a lower concentration of deaths at the end of the period. The measurement of inequalities in health is important for monitoring the population health situation.