Vol. 22 No. 1 (2024): Advancing Health Equity for the Disadvantaged: The Transformative Role of Social Work in Bridging the Gap

Health problems indicate the need for a basic human care and a public infrastructure of health care. Social work and social services are linked to the question of health and the existing health care in different ways. First of all, each user of social services is dependent on their own health and therefore on an adequate health care to cope with their everyday life. If there is a general lack of health care, opportunities for social work and social pedagogy are limited in almost all other areas. Second, there are different co-operational as well as conflictual relations between social work or social pedagogy and the medical professions and their organisations. Social work is for example a profession in the context of health care (e.g. in hospitals) and medical professions are at the same time very influential agencies in the existing societies in regard to define deviant behaviour or diagnosed needs, users have to deal with. Not at least, the access to health care and the conditions for human health are highly dependent from the social position of the people. Living in poverty brings with it a greater risk of illness and a lower life expectancy. Conversely, wealthy members of the society have better health and a longer life expectancy. Woman have poorer access to health care and are often confronted with a gender-insensitive health system. Trends in privatisation and commercialisation, which can be observed worldwide since the 1980s at least, are making the situation even worse.

Therefore, questions of health care and health equity are fundamental questions for social services, social work and social pedagogy. Social Work & Society (SW&S) is therefore very grateful to our guest editors, Anoop C Choolayil (Puducherry/IND) and Dilip Diwakar G (New Delhi/IND), for being responsible for the current special issue. It contains the following papers:

• Obstacles Faced by Palestinian Refugees in Accessing Health Services (Abdulaziz Albrithen et al.)
• Health Financing and Equity in Healthcare for Disadvantaged Groups in Vietnam (Thi Xuan Huong Le et al.)
• Social Work at Hamad Medical Corporation: Historical Perspective written (Nada Eltaiba and Suad Al Hamad)
• Poly-Victimisation and Health Risk Behaviors amongst Street Children in Zimbabwe (Constance Gunhidzirai and Leila Patel)
• Ensuring Equity in Health Services in Hospital Settings through Social Work Interventions: A Mixed Method Study (Md. Golam Azam et al.)
• Re-Examining Intimate Partner Violence: Feminist Social Work Reflections (Meenu Anand and Gunjan Chandhok)
• Domestic Violence, Mental Health, and COVID-19: A Community-based Study of Women in Delhi (Ajit Kumar Lenka et al.)
• Social Work Education and Health Equity in India: A Critical Review (Ngaopunii Trichao Thomas)
• Prevalence, Patterns and Implications of Gender-Based Violence against Women –Challenges and the Way Forward (Sigamani Panneer et al.)
• Preventing and Controlling Tuberculosis through Village Adoption Model in Koppal District of Karnataka: A Case Study (D. Srinivasa)
• Nutritional Status among the Women and Children in Bangladesh: Implications for Health Social Work Practice (Hanumant Waghmare et al.)
• Inter-State Migration, Footloose Labour and Accessibility to Health Care: An Exploration among Metro Workers of a Camp in Bengaluru (Venkatanarayanan Sethuraman et al.)
• Health Social Workers in Promoting Mental Health Equity: Voice and Agency for the Marginalized (Chandramathi Ramaswamy et al.)
• Understanding Experiences of Medical Social Workers Managing Older Adults with Chronic Illnesses: Insights from Nigeria (Oluwagbemiga Oyinlola et al.)
• Structural Violations of Mental Health Equity among Divorced Women: Challenges and Policy Implications (Fathima Sherin Ottakkam Thodukayil et al.)

There are also a number of stimulating contributions, our SW&S.Readers can find in the forum of the current issue.

• Prepared for the future? Social work students, ontological insecurity and the turning point in Swedish refugee policies (Norma Montesino et al.)
• Ageing after the Loss of Partner: Exploring the Lives of Widowed Older Adults in Kerala (Laxmi Putran et al.)
• The implementation of social policies in a pandemic context: an analysis of anger (Andrea Dettano and Rebeca Cena)

We wish our readers a stimulating read of the current issue.