Spatial Inequalities Health, Poverty, and Place in Accra, Ghana

This book provides a fresh analysis of the demography, health and well-being of a major African city.  It brings a range of disciplinary approaches to bear on the pressing topics of urban poverty, urban health inequalities and urban growth.  The approach is primarily spatial and includes the integration of environmental information from satellites and other geospatial sources with social science and health survey data. The authors Ghanaians and outsiders, have worked to understand the urban dynamics in this burgeoning West African metropolis, with an emphasis on urban disparities in health and living standards. Few cities in the global South have been examined from so many different perspectives. Our analysis employs a wide range of GIScience methods, including analysis of remotely sensed imagery and spatial statistical analysis, applied to a wide range of data, including census, survey and health clinic data, all of which are supplemented by field work, including systematic social observation, focus groups, and key informant interviews. This book aims to explain and highlight the mix of methods, and the important findings that have been emerging from this research, with the goal of providing guidance and inspiration for others doing similar work in cities of other developing nations.

Contributors.- Acknowledgments.- Part I: Introduction: 1: Introduction to the Accra School: An Overview of Health, Poverty, and Place in Accra: John R. Weeks, Allan G. Hill, and Justin Stoler.- Part II: Accra’s Urban Morphology and Neighborhood Structure.- 2: Defining Neighborhood Boundaries for Urban Health Research: A Case Study of Accra, Ghana: Ryan Engstrom, Caetlin Ofiesh, David Rain, Henry Jewell, and John Weeks.- 3: Neighborhoods of Health: Comparing boundaries for measuring contextual effects on health in Accra, Ghana: Marta Jankowska.- 4: Delineation and Classification of Urban Neighborhoods of Accra, Ghana, from Quickbird Imagery: Manual vs. Semi-Automated Approaches: Christopher D. Lippitt,  Douglas A. Stow, Sory Toure, and Milo Vejraska.- 5: Methods for Texture-based Classification of Urban Fringe Areas from Medium and High Resolution Satellite Imagery: Lasse Møller-Jensen.- Part III: Health and Well-being in Accra’s Neighborhoods: 6: Exploring Social Resilience among Young Migrants in Old Fadama, an Accra Slum: Raymond Asare Tutu.- 7: Researching Urban Slum Health in Nima, a Slum in Accra: Emmanuel Aggrey-Korsah, Joseph Oppong.- 8: What if Neighbors' Neighborhoods Differ? The Influence of Neighborhood Definitions of Health Outcomes in Accra: Alex Zvoleff, Li An, Justin Stoler, John R. Weeks.- 9: Living Arrangements and Fertility: A Case Study in Southern Ghana: Magdalena Benza.- 10: Fertility in Context: Exploring Egocentric Neighborhoods in Accra: John R. Weeks, Justin Stoler, Allan G. Hill, Alex Zvoleff.- Part IV: Neighborhood Structure: Implications for the Future Provision of Health Services: 11: The Sachet Water Phenomenon in Accra: Socioeconomic, Environmental, and Public Health Implications for Water Security.- Justin Stoler.- 12: Healthcare Access In Three Residential Neighborhoods In Accra, Ghana: Godwin Arku, Paul Mkandawire, Isaac Luginaah, and Philip Baiden.- 13: Food Security in Accra: Anna Carla Lopez-Carr.- Index.