One Illness Away: Why People Become Poor and How they Escape Poverty

BOOK by Anirudh Krishna

Commentators who applaud the rapid economic strides taken by China and India should take note of the large-scale human tragedies that are occurring in parallel, writes Anirudh Krishna in this new book.

Krishna and his team spent the past decade conducting thousands of interviews in nearly 400 diverse communities around the world. The factors that drive individuals into poverty vary from place to place, although unexpected illnesses are a major cause almost every place where health care resources are lacking, Krishna argues.

Krishna calls on government officials, economists and others to pay more attention to the everyday lives and ordinary events that underlie poverty. Beyond country-level statistics and political headlines that grab attention, he argues, people in barrios and remote villages are confronting challenges whose solutions may not lie with economic growth alone.

Visit Oxford University Press for more information about the book