Health disparities across racial and ethnic groups persist in Canada. But how the country can effectively address them hinges upon how it can better study these differences.
In a recent paper I co-authored, we examine how researchers study racial and ethnic inequalities in health. We identify four persistent problems: unclear categories of race and ethnicity, a white-centred lens, heavy reliance on majority-defined health outcomes and limited explanation of why these disparities arise.
We discuss these issues drawing heavily on evidence from the United States. This reflects the state of the field: Much of the research and many of the frameworks used to study racial and ethnic health inequality come from the U.S. and have been widely applied in Canadian research.
