1. Intersecting household-level health and socio-economic vulnerabilities and the COVID-19 crisis : an analysis from the UK
- Author
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Julia Mikolai, Katherine Keenan, Hill Kulu, Economic & Social Research Council, University of St Andrews. School of Geography & Sustainable Development, and University of St Andrews. Sir James Mackenzie Institute for Early Diagnosis
- Subjects
H Social Sciences (General) ,Health (social science) ,Inequality ,Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Population ,Distribution (economics) ,health: COVID-19 ,Principal components analysis ,Disease cluster ,Article ,Health(social science) ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,SDG 3 - Good Health and Well-being ,RA0421 ,RA0421 Public health. Hygiene. Preventive Medicine ,Pandemic ,030212 general & internal medicine ,lcsh:Social sciences (General) ,education ,Socioeconomics ,household dynamics ,media_common ,education.field_of_study ,030505 public health ,Poverty ,business.industry ,lcsh:Public aspects of medicine ,Health Policy ,Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health ,COVID-19 ,lcsh:RA1-1270 ,3rd-DAS ,Disease control ,United Kingdom ,Health ,H1 ,Household dynamics ,lcsh:H1-99 ,Inequalities ,0305 other medical science ,business - Abstract
This research was supported by Economic and Social Research Council grant ES/K007394/1 and carried out in the ESRC Centre for Population Change (CPC). The effects of COVID-19 are likely to be social stratified. Disease control measures introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic mean that people spend much more time in their immediate households, due to lockdowns, the need to self-isolate, and school and workplace closures. This has elevated the importance of certain household–level characteristics for individuals’ current and future wellbeing. The multi-dimensional poverty and health inequalities literature suggests that poor health and socio-economic conditions cluster in the general population, which may exacerbate societal inequalities over time. This study investigates how COVID-19-related health- and socio-economic vulnerabilities occur at the household level, and how they are distributed across household types and geographical areas in the United Kingdom. Using a nationally representative cross-sectional study of UK households and applying principal components analysis, we derived summary measures representing different dimensions of household vulnerabilities critical during the COVID-19 epidemic: health, employment, housing, financial and digital. Our analysis highlights four key findings. First, although COVID-19-related health risks are concentrated in retirement-age households, a substantial proportion of working age households also face these risks. Second, different types of households exhibit different vulnerabilities, with working-age households more likely to face financial and housing precarities, and retirement-age households health and digital vulnerabilities. Third, there are area-level differences in the distribution of household-level -vulnerabilities across England and the constituent countries of the United Kingdom. Fourth, in many households, different dimensions of vulnerabilities intersect; this is especially prevalent among working-age households. The findings imply that the short- and long-term consequences of the COVID-19 crisis are likely to significantly vary by household type. Policy measures that aim to mitigate the health and socio-economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic should consider how vulnerabilities cluster and interact with one another across different household types, and how these may exacerbate already existing inequalities. Publisher PDF
- Published
- 2020