Preventing Chronic Disease (PCD) is a peer-reviewed electronic journal established by the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion. PCD provides an open exchange of information and knowledge among researchers, practitioners, policy makers, and others who strive to improve the health of the public through chronic disease prevention.
Preventing Chronic Disease (PCD) is a peer-reviewed electronic journal established by the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion. PCD provides an open exchange of information and knowledge among researchers, practitioners, policy makers, and others who strive to improve the health of the public through chronic disease prevention.
Preventing Chronic Disease (PCD) is a peer-reviewed electronic journal established by the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion. PCD provides an open exchange of information and knowledge among researchers, practitioners, policy makers, and others who strive to improve the health of the public through chronic disease prevention.
Although commercial entities can contribute positively to health and society there
is growing evidence that the products and practices of some commercial actors notably
the largest transnational corporations are responsible for escalating rates of avoidable
ill health, planetary damage, and social and health inequity; these problems are increasingly
referred to as the commercial determinants of health. The climate emergency, the non-communicable
disease epidemic, and that just four industry sectors (ie, tobacco, ultra-processed
food, fossil fuel, and alcohol) already account for at least a third of global deaths
illustrate the scale and huge economic cost of the problem.
Despite being globally pervasive, racism, xenophobia, and discrimination are not universally
recognised determinants of health. We challenge widespread beliefs related to the
inevitability of increased mortality and morbidity associated with particular ethnicities
and minoritised groups. In refuting that racial categories have a genetic basis and
acknowledging that socioeconomic factors offer incomplete explanations in understanding
these health disparities, we examine the pathways by which discrimination based on
caste, ethnicity, Indigeneity, migratory status, race, religion, and skin colour affect
health.