Using relative and absolute measures for monitoring health inequalities: experiences from cross-national analyses on maternal and child health

As reducing socio-economic inequalities in health is an important publichealth objective, monitoring of these inequalities is an important publichealth task. The specific inequality measure used can influence theconclusions drawn, and there is no consensus on which measure is mostmeaningful. The key issue raising most debate is whether to use relative orabsolute inequality measures. Our paper aims to inform this debate anddevelop recommendations for monitoring health inequalities on the basis ofempirical analyses for a broad range of developing countries.