Deprivation amplification and health promoting resources in the context of a poor country

Researchers have often indicated area deprivation as a factor in vulnerability amplification: poorest individuals are more likely to live in vulnerable areas, and the gap between rich and poor, as regards health and health-related behaviour, is exacerbated by the interactions between individual hardship and area deprivation. However, recent evidence has raised some objections to this hypothesis, suggesting that poor neighbourhoods are not necessarily poorer in terms of health promoting resources. But what happens in a poor country at a time of economic slowdown? The aim of this study was to analyse the availability of 58 types of local resource within the Lisbon Metropolitan Area, Portugal, assessed by quintile of neighbourhood deprivation. The analysis identifies clear associations between the availability of health promoting resources and deprivation: 67% of the analysed resources were less available in the most deprived neighbourhoods. We observe the emergence of a disadvantageous pattern where lack of neighbourhood resources tends to overlap with socioeconomic deprivation shaping a run-down environment that is potentially harmful to health.