Joaquim Jorge Fernandes Soares

Corporate crime is a widespread societal issue that causes significant physical, emotional, and financial harm. Despite its prevalence, research examining its effects from a public health perspective remains limited. This viewpoint paper, informed by a systematic review, examines the relationship between corporate crime and mental health, highlighting potential associations and methodological gaps. Evidence from OECD countries identified only two empirical studies, both conducted in Spain, both focusing on financial fraud, leaving other forms of corporate wrongdoing largely underexplored. The discussion is guided by a conceptual framework linking corporate financial violations to mental health outcomes, integrating stress theory, social determinants of health, and bidirectional pathways in which mental health may also influence corporate crime. The paper outlines a research agenda for public health researchers, addressing priority populations, study designs, measurement approaches, and policy implications. By bridging criminology and public health perspectives, this approach offers both theoretical insight and practical guidance for understanding and mitigating the mental health impacts of corporate crime. This framework constitutes the paper’s primary conceptual contribution by explicitly integrating criminological and public health perspectives into a multi-level and bidirectional model that has not been systematically articulated in prior literature. Rather than providing generalisable OECD-wide evidence, the paper highlights a substantial empirical gap within OECD settings and identifies key directions for future research.

Social workers and public health professionals are expected to collaborate in promoting health and social equity to address the complex challenges faced by societies now and in the future. This collaboration is particularly crucial in low-income countries, where social and health issues significantly affect people’s wellbeing. This study explored social workers’ perceptions of their role in society, their collaboration with public health professionals, and the importance of sustainable development in their professional practice. An exploratory qualitative study was conducted between March and June 2024, involving semi-structured interviews with twelve professional social workers from the three main geographic regions of Mozambique (north, central, and south). Content analysis was used to identify and synthesize the key categories that emerged from the data. Four main categories were identified: limited public understanding of the mission and practice of social work; a lack of collaboration with public health professionals; the integration of sustainable development goals into social work practice; and anticipated future challenges for Mozambique’s social and public health sectors. The findings highlight a perceived lack of societal awareness regarding the role of social workers and limited interprofessional collaboration, with barriers such as poor communication and a lack of mutual understanding between the two professions. Moreover, the participants recognized the need to contribute, through their daily work alongside public health professionals, to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals.

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a public health and social problem worldwide. However, most studies have concentrated on violence against women and not also against men. Interventions for victimized men will only be successful if there is a better understanding of the real experiences, as narrated by the victims themselves, and how these impact their health and wellbeing. This study aimed to investigate the experiences of intimate partner violence, health, and wellbeing among men in east-central Sweden. Data were gathered using eleven in-depth, semi-structured interviews with men who were victims of IPV. Four categories emerged from the analyses: experiences of abuse in the relationship; feelings of isolation, loneliness, and shame; perceived deterioration of health and wellbeing; and negative experiences with public services. The findings indicate that interviewees experienced psychological (rather than physical) violence at the hands of their intimate partner. The abuse had consequences for their health and wellbeing, as they experienced stress, anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts. In some instances, it affected their health behavior, as they reverted to alcohol and drug use to cope with the abuse. Moreover, the interviewees felt lonely and unwilling to disclose their suffering because of fear of what family, friends, society, and professionals across different services would think of them. Also, they experienced negative responses from the health and social care services and police when seeking help, which made them even more entrenched in their fear of disclosing the suffering caused by the abuse.

In view of global population ageing and of policies that support longer working lives, especially in developed countries, it is important to achieve diversity in organisations through age management. Age management is the “management of human resources, [often] with an explicit focus on the requirements of an ageing workforce.” Through age management practices, organisations will be better able to change their human resource management policies and practices towards accommodating their ageing workforce. Little is known about age management practices in Scandinavian organisations, considering the region’s high prevalence of workers beyond the age of 50 across both private and public organisations. There are indications that Scandinavian business organisations are already practicing age management for all ages, including older workers. Their age management practices include the dimensions of job recruitment, training, lifelong learning, development, and promotion. However, there is a dearth of knowledge on how the health and well-being of workers is ensured in the context of age management practices in these organisations. Given the current and future importance of age management for all organisations globally, public health and other health science professionals need to collaborate with other disciplines, such as management and sustainability science, to better understand how they can contribute to an aged and healthier workforce as well as workplace health promotion. This paper aims to contribute to the discussion concerning age management in public and private institutions in Scandinavia through the public health lens.

Introduction: Falls among older adults are a significant cause of disability, injury, and death worldwide. The high incidence of falls in older adults, combined with the increased susceptibility to injury of the older adult population, leads to severe global health issues. Further studies are needed to comprehensively evaluate the typical personal and environmental risk factors of falls in the Iranian elderly population. Future preventive strategies and intervention programs will be based on these findings. The study determined the risk factors associated with unintentional falls among a representative sample of older adults living in Tehran, the capital city of Iran. Methods: The study design was cross-sectional. The target population was men/women aged 65 years and over from the general population living in 22 different districts of Tehran who were selected by stratified random sampling. The researchers gathered the data using validated questionnaires and observations. The informed consent was obtained from all participants before starting the interview. Multivariate logistic regression analysis examined the association between falls occurring during the past 12 months with demographics/ socioeconomics and fall-related predictor factors. Results: The risk of falls was higher in women (47.0%) and those aged ≥ 75 years (44.1%). Older adults who were married had their fall risk reduced by 36.4% compared with other types of marital status. Older adults who were illiterate (48.1%), housewives (47.0%), and always had concerns about living expenses (53.9%) tended significantly to have a higher risk of falls. Moreover, participants who live with their family were less likely to fall than those who live alone (36.5% vs. 40.4%). Persons with safe homes were less likely to experience falls than persons with unsafe homes (30.9% vs. 41.4%). The logistic regression analysis showed that the female gender, being worried about living expenses, home safety, functional behavior, and function factors, were independently associated with the risk of falls during the past 12 months. Conclusions: Our findings revealed that a wide range of intrinsic and extrinsic risk factors contributed to injurious falls; based on the literature, some are preventable. The present data may be helpful as a starting point and guide future efforts for health providers and policymakers to allocate additional resources and develop proper falls prevention or intervention programs at the community level.

Fear of crime is an important public health problem that impacts people’s quality of life, health, and wellbeing, and causes mental health ailments (e.g., anxiety). This study aimed to determine whether there was an association between fear of crime, educational attainment, and self-rated health and anxiety among women residing in a county in east-central Sweden. A sample (n = 3002) of women aged 18–84 years surveyed in the Health on Equal Terms survey carried out in 2018 was included in the study. Bivariate and multivariate regression analysis was performed on the relationship between the composite variables fear of crime, educational attainment, and self-rated health and anxiety. Women with primary education or similar who reported fear of crime had increased odds of poor health (odds ratio (OR) 3.17; 95% confidence interval (CI) 2.40–4.18) compared with women with primary education/similar and no fear of crime (OR 2.90; CI 1.90–3.20). A statistically significant relationship persisted in the multivariate analysis after controlling for other covariates, although the odds were reduced (OR 1.70; CI 1.14–2.53 and 1.73; CI 1.21–2.48, respectively). Similarly, in the bivariate analysis, women who reported fear of crime and who only had primary education had statistically significant odds of anxiety (OR 2.12; CI 1.64–2.74); the significance was removed, and the odds were reduced (OR 1.30; CI 0.93–1.82) after adjusting for demographic, socioeconomic, and health-related covariates. Women with only primary education or similar who reported fear of crime had higher odds of poor health and anxiety compared with those with university education or similar, with and without fear of crime. Future studies (including longitudinal ones) are warranted—on the one hand, to understand possible mechanisms of the relationship between educational attainment and fear of crime and its consequences to health, and on the other, to explore low-educated women’s own perceptions regarding factors underlining their fear of crime (qualitative studies).

Background and Objectives: Interpersonal violence is a social and public health problem globally, and though it is related to poor health outcomes across all genders, most research has been directed towards violence against women. As a result, the health consequences of men’s victimization may be underreported and unaddressed. The purpose of this study was to assess the relationship between interpersonal violence and the psychological health outcomes of self-reported stress, anxiety, and depression among men. Materials and Methods: The study used data from the male sample (n = 2597) of the 2018 Health on Equal Terms Survey conducted in Gävleborg County in East-Central Sweden. Regression analysis was carried out to study the relationship between interpersonal violence and self-reported stress, anxiety, and depression. Results: The bivariate analysis showed that there was a statistically significant association between interpersonal violence and self-reported stress (OR 2.35; CI 1.45–3.81), anxiety (OR 1.54; CI 1.06–2.25), and depression (OR 2.30; CI 1.48–3.57). Controlling for other variables in the multivariate analysis removed the statistically significant relationship and reduced the odds ratios for stress (OR 1.46; CI 0.57–3.74), anxiety (OR 0.86; 0.40–1.84), and depression (OR 1.40; CI 0.67–3.32) respectively. Conclusions: The study found that interpersonal violence among men was associated with stress, anxiety and depression which was largely explained by demographic, socioeconomic, and health/behavior-related factors. The findings suggest the need for longitudinal studies to assess causal links between male victimization and psychological health outcomes at the county level.

Food insecurity and intimate partner violence are important determinants of health and wellbeing in southern Africa. However, very little research has attempted to investigate the association between them even though food insecurity is anticipated to increase in the region, mostly owing to climate change. The objective of this paper was to descriptively review peer reviewed studies that investigated the relationship between food insecurity and intimate partner violence in southern Africa. Literature searches were carried out in Scopus, Web of Science and PubMed databases without any time restriction. A total of five studies that investigated the association between food insecurity and intimate partner violence were identified in South Africa and Swaziland. Of these four studies used a cross-sectional design, and one employed a longitudinal design. Samples varied from 406 to 2479 individuals. No empirical studies were found for the remaining southern African countries of Angola, Botswana, Malawi, Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, and Mozambique. Moreover, the reported findings indicated that there was an association between food insecurity and interpersonal violence (i.e., physical, psychological, and emotional) in the sub-region regardless the fact that the five studies used diverse measurements of both food insecurity and intimate partner violence.

Background: The aim of this study was to investigate the impact of employment status on self-reported health in Gävleborg County. Methods: The study used data from the 2010 Health in Equal terms survey, a cross-sectional survey carried out in Gävleborg County in Sweden. A total of 4,245 individuals, aged 16–65 years were included in the analysis. Descriptive and logistic regression analyses were used to assess the relationship between employment status and self-reported health Results: People who were outside the labour market had odds of poor health of 2.64 (Cl 2.28–3.05) compared to their employed counterparts. Controlling for other covariates reduced the risk slightly to 2.10 (1.69-2.60) but remained statistically significant. In addition, other variables were associated with self-reported poor health Conclusion: This study found a statistically significant association between being outside the labour market and poor self-reported health. The relation was explained partially by socio-economic and demographic variables. Further studies are needed to further investigate the observed relationships. Longitudinal studies are needed to further investigate the observed relationship. Policy-makers within the Gävleborg County need to pay attention to the health status of those out of work, especially during times of combined economic and labour market fluctuations. Results of the study suggest the need to pay attention to the health status of those outside the labour market especially during times of economic hardship.

We investigated the association between type and frequency of elder maltreatment (EM) and residential setting (rural, suburban, and urban settings in the U.S. and northern and southern cities in Europe). We used data on 7,225 participants from European and U.S. cross-sectional studies to estimate rates of EM in three domains in the five settings in logistic-linear models that included setting and demographic variables and tested prespecified contrasts on settings. Northern Europe is similar to the U.S. in rate of financial exploitation; the Mediterranean has higher rates than either of the other two. For emotional and physical maltreatment, the Mediterranean is similar to the U.S; Northern Europe has higher rates. EM differs between and within settings in the U.S. and Europe. There is a need for rigorous research to examine the effects of residential settings and environment on EM. Interventions to reduce EM should be explored.