Social and economic inequality is detrimental to the health of any society. Especially when the society is diverse, multicultural, overpopulated and undergoing rapid but unequal economic growth. It is apparent to some degrees that the effects of social and economic inequality in healthcare delivery of a society are profound. In a large, overpopulated countries, such as the United States, especially India and China with its complex social architecture and economic extremes, the effects on health system is multi-fold. The unequal distribution of human resources is an example of this inequality, and adversely affects the health status of under-privileged population. The socially under-privileged are incompetent to access the healthcare due to geographical, social, economic or gender related distances. Growing but unregulated private healthcare sectors make the gap between rich and poor more apparent.
An important focus of population determinants that is of unique in nature and of which displays rare attention from healthcare professionals, and of which influences health disparities is the issue of market accountability. Market on itself needs to be reviewed and understood, and to access the broader courtesy of the nature in population-focused determinants.
In order to elaborate more and to distinguish from other consumer-driven market, health care differs from other goods and services in imperative ways. For example, the output of a shoe factory is shoes. But the output of the health care industry is less well demarcated. It is erratic and imperfectly understood by producers and manufacturers, and still less by consumers. Also, third-party payment and government intervention are ubiquitous. None of these characteristics is unique to health care, but their extent and their interaction are. However, health care marketplaces obey the central rules of economics, and economic study is indispensable in evaluating public procedure.
WHO Commission on the Social Determinants of Health (2008) gave a perfect description of market accountability by explicitly classifying market, as a route of bringing health benefits in many forms, such as new technologies, goods and services, improved standard of living and business profitability. However, marketplaces create negative environmental conditions for health to prosper. In this form, marketplace brings about negativity in the form of economic inequalities, resource diminution, ecofriendly population, unhealthy and unequal working conditions and most importantly the circulations of population interaction from the haves and the haves’ not.
Market accountability can be improved market using the application of sound marketing ethics. Ethics are a collection of principles of right conduct that shape the decisions people or organizations make. Practicing ethics in healthcare marketing means deliberately applying standards of fairness, or rights and wrongs, to marketing decision-making, behavior, and practice in the organization. Lastly, importance of marketing ethics driving conscious consumption are: ethics are the moral principles and values that govern individuals or group decisions; they serve as a roadmap on how to act rightly and justly when faced with ethical dilemmas. It sometimes deals with personal and moral principles of one’s value; mind judgment may play a larger role when defining ethical and legal boundaries; actions that are technically legal could be viewed as unethical. By doing so, the market can work on itself to account for its competitive advantages.
WHO Commission on the Social Determinants of Health. (2008). Closing the gap in a generation: Health equity through action on the social determinants of health. Executive summary. Retrieved from http://www.who.int/social_determinants/final_report/csdh_finalreport_2008.pdf
