Social determinants and the health of drug users: socioeconomic status, homelessness, and incarceration.
OBJECTIVE
This article reviews the evidence on the adverse health consequences of low socioeconomic status, homelessness, and incarceration among drug users.


METHODS
Social and economic factors shape risk behavior and the health of drug users. They affect health indirectly by shaping individual drug-use behavior; they affect health directly by affecting the availability of resources, access to social welfare systems, marginalization, and compliance with medication. Minority groups experience a disproportionately high level of the social factors that adversely affect health, factors that contribute to disparities in health among drug users.


CONCLUSIONS
Public health interventions aimed at improving the health of drug users must address the social factors that accompany and exacerbate the health consequences of illicit drug use.
Galea
Sandro
S
Center for Urban Epidemiologic Studies, New York Academy of Medicine, 1216 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY, 10029-5293, USA. sgalea@nyam.org
Vlahov
David
D
D006703:Ill-Housed Persons / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D013287:Illicit Drugs; D008913:Minority Groups / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011287:Prejudice; D015995:Prevalence; D011329:Prisoners / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011634:Public Health; D012309:Risk-Taking; D012923:Social Class; D012931:Social Environment; D012946:Social Welfare / Q000208:ethnology; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders / Q000191:economics / Q000208:ethnology*; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology
D013287:Illicit Drugs