Disparities in access to essential rights and services such as health are rarely quantified. Existing national data is very limited, outdated or not disaggregated by ethnicity, social and legal status, which makes it difficult to analyse the extent of health inequalities between vulnerable groups, such as ethnic minorities, including Roma, people with disabilities, LGBTQI+, migrants and refugees, homeless persons, and the general population.
Measuring such gaps is, therefore, essential to build knowledge about their impact, especially in the wake of COVID-19 and national responses to the pandemic; to develop appropriate policy responses; better identify the communities’ health needs; and implement targeted measures proportionate to the challenges that each community/vulnerable group experiences.
Focusing on European and national public policies such as European Pillar of Social Rights and its action plan; the European Semester; national recovery and resilience plans; European Child Guarantee and national action plans; European anti-Racism Action Plan; European and national health programmes, EPHA is calling on researchers and policy analysts to submit a research proposal to help build knowledge about how the health of disadvantaged groups is affected by inequalities in employment, housing, education, healthcare, environment and climate.
EPHA will collect your case studies and bring them to the attention of the European Union, national governments and other health policymakers to mobilise policy and decision makers as well as European and national civil society actors to take action to build health equity in Europe.
Possible topics for your research
- Public investment in health and how it meets the needs of vulnerable groups
- Lessons learned from the pandemic in health/social/economic/human rights protection of vulnerable groups
- Prevention of non-communicable diseases, including cancer and vulnerable groups
- Health impact of housing exclusion (e.g substandard housing, poor access to decent and affordable housing, evictions and house demolition, homelessness)
- Mental health and lockdowns
- Healthy diets and people at risk of poverty and exclusion
- Good practices for building capacities of health workforce to better meet the needs of vulnerable groups
- Gender-based violence and mental health protection
- Prevention of child obesity
- Barriers in access to early childhood development services (health, nutrition, safety, early learning)
- Child protection in COVID19
- Social support for children and parents from vulnerable groups
Health in all policies
- Environment and climate
- Mitigating energy poverty at national and local levels
- Climate divide and vulnerable groups
- Urban transportation/connection to public transportation
- Digital divide and access to health services
- Accessibility of e-learning in COVID19
- Digitalisation in healthcare
- Good practices for increasing digital literacy among vulnerable groups
- Access to COVID19 vaccines and digitalisation
How to submit your case study proposal
Please send your submission to Radost Zaharieva, Policy Coordinator, Health Inequalities at firstname.lastname@example.org. Please contact Radost if you have any questions about the process.
The application must contain:
- CV in English (maximum 2 pages)
- A proposal including a description of the issue which will be addressed/analysed, geographical region, the research structure and a methodology which will be applied (maximum 600 words)
Geographical and gender balance will be respected.
The length of the paper should be between 8-10 pages (Times New Roman, 12, space between lines: 1,15) and should consist of the following:
- Executive summary (one page)
- Introduction (one page). This part must include a description of the topic and issues that will be analysed in the paper, geographical scope and information about the methodology
- Main discussion – this part must include policy recommendations
References, pictures, tables and other resources should be presented in an annex – there is no limitation of the number of pages.
The deadline is 10 August 2021 | 23:59 CEST
- 10 August 2021 (end of the day) – submission of proposals
- 16 August – 20 August – selection process
- 21 August – 30 September – research activities
- 1 October – Deadline for submitting papers
- 8 October, feedback from EPHA
- 20 October – publication of the final papers
European Charter on Health Equity
Health inequalities: a public health challenge for policy makers
Leaping forward: adapting the post-2020 EU Roma Framework to the real needs of beneficiaries
Ensuring equitable access to COVID19 vaccines
Should governments consider Roma a priority in their Covid-19 vaccination roll-out plans?
The Marmot Review 10 Years On: New EPHA study on its lessons for the European Union
Ensuring a good start in life for all Roma children