Public health is an interdisciplinary field that aims to enhance the quality of life for societies, communities, and individuals through disease prevention and the promotion of healthy policies and interventions. Its scope encompasses physical, psychological, and emotional health, integrating fields such as epidemiology, biostatistics, social sciences, environmental health, and sexual and reproductive health. Public health professionals collaborate with various stakeholders to implement strategies like disease outbreak control, public health education, and healthy habit promotion. Despite progress, challenges like health equity for marginalized communities persist.This dissertation identifies two current limitations in public health approaches and discusses an emerging challenge. First, public health struggles with novel social determinants of health, such as immigration enforcement. Second, it fails to fully incorporate historical injustices into the study of the social determinants of health. Third, evolving technologies like AI present future challenges to health equity, including the obfuscation of the social determinants of health. The dissertation advocates for a more expansive understanding of the social determinants of health and advocates integrating these elements into public health research. Collectively, these chapters argue for a comprehensive public health approach that includes broader social, political, and economic factors, historical context, and careful evaluation of technological solutions. This approach emphasizes interdisciplinary collaboration, policy change, and a focus on social justice to address health disparities effectively. The insights from these chapters contribute to more holistic public health strategies, ensuring equitable health outcomes for all, especially vulnerable populations.
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