Commercial Determinants of Health and its influence on trauma care

Abstract

As the World Health Organization (WHO) states, Commercial determinants of health (CDoH) are the private sector activities that affect people’s health, directly or indirectly, positively or negatively. The private sector influences the social, physical, and cultural environments through business actions and societal engagements. CDoH includes all products and services provided by private entities to gain a financial profit, market strategies, research funding, working conditions, production externalities, and political activities, such as misinformation, lobbying, and donations. Some parts of the private sector also use instrumental, structural, and discursive power to undermine public health policies that threaten profits. Therefore CDoH impacts a wide range of health outcomes, such as non-communicable diseases, communicable diseases and epidemics, injuries on roads and from weapons, violence, and mental health conditions