On the other hand, I seem to remember a (BBC?) TV documentary which purported to explain Britain's being the lead country in the IR on account of a take-off in public health *coupled with* availability of technology to mechanise industrial processes.
(A very British documentary -- the PHR was explained on the grounds that widespread tea-drinking made the population more resistant to stomach-bugs, thus making larger towns, and hence factory towns, possible. Japan was adduced as counter-example: it had the tea and hence the large towns, but not the technology -- allegedly)
Given the likelihood that "public health" (but, including such things as obesity in the presence of malnourishment, also "private" health) either is or will soon be declining for many people in many parts of the world, I suspect Easterlin's Panglossary
Julian