Abstract
Significant advances in hygiene, medical science and technology have curtailed mortality and enhanced life expectancy over the world. Yet in the year 2000, the United Nations member states proposed eight Millennium Development Goals (MDG), including children’s and women’s health (MDG, 2000), in order to address persisting differences in health status across population groups. Recent statistics reveal the gendered dimensions of a circle of health inequality that will be the focus of this chapter. The State of World Children’s Report (UNICEF, 2009) shows that children’s health is intricately related with women’s health and nutrition (see also Chapter 21 by Sandall et al.). But what else do the survey figures tell us about the trends and contexts of the health of people, especially about women and children?
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Key reading
Claeson, M., R. Bose. T. Mawji and I. Pathmanathan (2000) ‘Reducing Child Mortality in India in the New Millennium’, Bulletin of World Health Organization, 78 (10), 1192–9.
Khanna, R., A. Kumar, J. F. Vaghela, V. Sreenivas and J. M. Puliyel (2003) ‘Community Based Retrospective Study of Sex in Infant Mortality in India’, British Medical Journal, 327, 126–8.
Patel, T. (ed.) (2007) Sex Selective Abortion in India (New Delhi: Sage).
UNICEF (2009) The State of World’s Children Report — 2009, at: www.unicef.org/infoby country/indep.htm, accessed 20 May 2009.
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© 2010 Tulsi Patel
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Patel, T. (2010). Mothers and Children: What Does Their Health Tell Us about Gender?. In: Kuhlmann, E., Annandale, E. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Gender and Healthcare. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230290334_17
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230290334_17
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