Health and Canadian Society: Sociological Perspectives. 3rd ed.

Marilyn Mardiros is an associate professor of health sciences at the
University of Ottawa.

Health and Canadian Society is the third edition of what has become a
classic text on the sociology of health and health care in Canada.
Substantially revised from the previous edition, the book examines such
issues as health-care reform, cost cutting, restructuring, downsizing,
shifting responsibilities from hospital to community care and the
family, managerial and fiscal efficiency and effectiveness, and the
hegemony of a business perspective.

The book is divided into seven parts; respectively, these deal with the
social and historical development of health care in Canada up to the
1970s, the fiscal aspects of health care, social factors in health and
illness (including poverty, race, gender, and drug use), formal and
informal health-care providers, hospitals as health factories, policy
and community participation in health, and the social responsibility for
health care. This book is a must-read for students in the health and
social sciences and for anyone interested in understanding the social
context within which Canadians experience health and illness, as well as
develop and receive health care.