"Overall, these findings show that even in times of great economic inequality, inequality in health outcomes is not inevitable but is strongly mediated by policy."
Acknowledging income inequality as a problem, even if it isn't have a negative effect on whether you die earlier or not.
"...in times of great economic inequality..."
^Is intentionally sensationalized, the notion being that economic inequality in our society is generally viewed as a negative. Consider the following:
"...in times of great famine..."
Now you could try to make the argument that someone is merely stating a fact and picked an adjatiave which helps the reader picture what's going on, but I don't think anyone would assume the author considered famine to be a "neutral fact". Similarly, the end snippet is clearly addressing the elephant in the room given the title of the article, which was certainly chosen due to the subject matter, but also due the phrase which we are debating (income inequality), which is essentially another way or saying that a class of people are losing wealth to another class.
For those of us who believe economic inequality is both good and natural, this is a great rhetorical device for undermining the left -- "in this time of great economic inequality, life is better than it has ever been for the general populace."
A person on the left may use the opposite rhetorical device, "in this time of great economic freedom, people are increasingly poor."
As this is written, there is no way to know which rhetorical device they were using.