A mother and her child -
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Social inequalities in health appear even before birth, with differences in prenatal care and risky behaviors of some mothers from disadvantaged backgrounds for the unborn child.
And the medical monitoring of children and adolescents is less for children from working-class backgrounds.
It is a paradox.
While France has a health system considered to be one of the most efficient in the world, with care and treatment fully or partially covered by health insurance, children are far from equal in terms of health. .
Differences that exist even before the birth of a baby, as shown by INSEE in its study
France social portrait
published this Thursday.
"Inequalities are already appearing because of the less favorable living conditions among pregnant women from the poorest backgrounds," observes Sylvie Le Minez, head of the demographic and social studies unit at INSEE.
Example with smoking: if 94% of female managers say they have not smoked in the third trimester of pregnancy, 66% of workers indicate it.
The psychological context of pregnancy is also more unfavorable among women who have never held a job, manual workers: 12% of them say they felt “bad” or “bad enough” during their pregnancy, against 7% for executives and 8% for intermediate professions.
More risk of overweight for children from disadvantaged families
“The follow-up of pregnant women is also later and less important for women from disadvantaged backgrounds,” notes Sylvie Le Minez.
And the consequences are felt.
Because when a problem arises during pregnancy, women from modest backgrounds are more likely to be hospitalized: 18% of workers have experienced prenatal hospitalization, against 13% of executives.
And as soon as they are born, babies are not all in the same physical shape.
"There are more premature babies or babies with low birth weight in disadvantaged areas," says Sylvie Le Minez.
When they grow up, the differences don't fade away.
Because at the same birth weight, there is a greater risk for a child from a working-class background to be overweight.
This is the case for 16% of children of workers aged 5-6 years, against 7% of those of managers.
The consequence of lifestyle habits that promote weight gain.
Because according to INSEE, 26% of children of workers in CM2 consume sugary drinks every day, against 15% of children of executives.
In addition, 16% of the former spend more than two hours a day in front of the screens during the week, against 8% of the latter.
This increases their sedentary lifestyle and their risk of gaining weight.
And children from privileged families more often take part in extra-curricular sports.
Less access to healthcare
And even if modest families - like others - have access to doctors, free consultations from the PMI (maternal and child protection), free health check-ups from the Health Insurance and medical examinations at school, the fact is that children from modest backgrounds have less access to care.
Their vision problems or their dental defects are therefore corrected less: 28% of students in 3rd year whose parents are manual workers have dental devices, against 48% of children of managers, and 31% wear glasses against 37% of children of frames.
"The lesser recourse can be explained by a less good understanding of the functioning of the system and of information on health, whether it concerns prevention or care, and by a social distance from the medical world", explains INSEE. in his work.
Consequences for their future life
At the end of adolescence, 17 year olds from disadvantaged backgrounds are 28% to smoke, against 20% of those in executives.
It is only when it comes to alcohol consumption that they are less at risk.
Because
binge drinking
(which consists of drinking a lot and quickly, i.e. five drinks or more on one occasion at least three times a month) is more common among young people from privileged backgrounds (18%) than among those from modest backgrounds (13 %).
And these social inequalities in health do not only have consequences for the well-being of children.
They will also have it in their future life.
First of all concerning medical monitoring habits.
"A child who has acquired the habit of seeing a dentist regularly will have a better chance of reproducing this behavior in adulthood," underlines INSEE.
And prevention makes it possible to avoid heavy and expensive treatments later.
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