As the desert advances… What measures can be taken to combat the health divide, a factor contributing to vulnerability?

Vulnerability isn't always where you'd expect it to be.

While it is certainly common to all individuals, it is not evenly distributed. In recent decades, the term has become widely used and is closely associated with exclusion and precariousness. It is used to describe the risks we face in a context of growing uncertainty and our inability to control them.

Some situations of vulnerability are obvious (disabilities, chronic illnesses, childhood, and old age, etc.). Others, which have emerged more recently, are less widely recognized. This is the case for people living in areas with a shortage of medical care.

A growing healthcare divide… 30% of French people live in a medical desert.

There is widespread agreement that regional disparities in access to health care have worsened. For the past thirty years or so, public policies have failed to reverse this trend.

… and reveals a new form of vulnerability. The loss of opportunities resulting from this growing inequality in access to healthcare is an intolerable breach of the republican pact and the social contract. Systemic change is imperative in the face of such public health challenges. How can physicians’ civic responsibility better contribute to reducing regional inequalities in access to care? What urgent measures must be taken to restore balance to the forces at play and level the playing field?

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