Read essays on: 1. Essay on the Meaning and Definition of Health 2. Essay on Health for Class 10 3. Essay on Health (500 words) 4. Essay on the Effects of Emotions on Health 5. Essay on Major Achievements of Health Sector 6. Essay on the Objectives of Health Sector during 11th Plan 7. Essay on Health is Wealth – Universal Immunization Program (UIP) 8. Essay on the Epidemiological Perspectives of Health 9. Essay on Disease Burden and Surveillance 10. Essay on Health Scenario. Compilation of essays on ‘Health’ for class 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12. Find paragraphs, long and short essays on ‘Health’ especially written for school and college students. Also learn about: 1. Essay on health for class 10 2. Essay on importance of health 3. Essay on healthy body 4. Health essay 500 words 5. Health essay example 6. 1000 words essay on health is wealth.
Essay on Health
Essay Contents:
- Essay on the Meaning and Definition of Health
- Essay on Health for Class 10
- Essay on Health (500 words)
- Essay on the Effects of Emotions on Health
- Essay on Major Achievements of Health Sector
- Essay on the Objectives of Health Sector during 11th Plan
- Essay on Health is Wealth – Universal Immunization Program (UIP)
- Essay on the Epidemiological Perspectives of Health
- Essay on Disease Burden and Surveillance
- Essay on Health Scenario
1. Essay on the Meaning and Definition of Health:
Health is defined by World Health Organization (WHO) as, a “State of complete physical, mental, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.”
For humans, physical health means a good body health, which is healthy because of regular physical activity (exercise), good nutrition, and adequate rest.
As a country’s or region’s people experience improved nutrition, health care, standards of living and quality of life, their height and weight generally increase.
In fact, most people, when asked for a definition of health talk about physical health. Physical health relates to anything concerning our bodies as physical entities. Physical health has been the basis for active living campaigns and the many nutrition drives that have swept the industrialized world. People are exposed to so much “physical health” data these days that it is hard to decide what is relevant and what is not.
Another term for physical health is physical wellbeing. Physical wellbeing is defined as something a person can achieve by developing all health-related components of his/her lifestyle. Fitness reflects a person’s cardio respiratory endurance, muscular strength, flexibility, and body composition.
Other contributors to physical wellbeing may include proper nutrition, bodyweight management, abstaining from drug abuse, avoiding alcohol abuse, responsible sexual behavior (sexual health), hygiene, and getting the right amount of sleep.
Health is a dynamic condition resulting from a body’s constant adjustment and adaptation in response to stresses and changes in the environment for maintaining an inner equilibrium called homeostasis.
There is a need for good health. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) good health is not merely the absence of disease; it is also a reflection of the social and mental well-being of people in a community. Thus, to achieve the goal of providing health for all, improvements in a community should aim not simply to reduce disease, but also to reduce social tensions and mental ill-health to acceptable levels.
2. Essay on Health for Class 10:
The perspective on individual health covers nutritional, socio-cultural and developmental aspects and dietary diversity for good health. As per WHO, the determinants of health includes the social and economic environment, the physical environment, and the person’s individual characteristics and behaviors.
Nutrition is nourishment or energy that is obtained from food consumed or the process of consuming the proper amount of nourishment and energy. The substances that you take into your body as food and the way that they influence your health.
The diet of an organism is what it eats, which is largely determined by the availability, the processing and palatability of foods. A healthy diet includes preparation of food and storage methods that preserve nutrients from oxidation, heat or leaching, and that reduce risk of food-borne illnesses.
A poor diet may have an injurious impact on health, causing deficiency diseases such as blindness, anemia, scurvy, preterm birth, stillbirth and cretinism, health- threatening conditions like obesity and metabolic syndrome and such common chronic systemic diseases as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and osteoporosis. A poor diet can cause the wasting of kwashiorkor in acute cases, and the stunting of marasmus in chronic cases of malnutrition.
1. Macronutrients – Carbohydrates, proteins, fats and water
2. Micronutrients – Minerals, vitamins, phytochemicals and anti-oxidants.
Malnutrition:
Malnutrition refers to insufficient, excessive, or imbalanced consumption of nutrients by an organism. In developed countries, the diseases of malnutrition are most often associated with nutritional imbalances or excessive consumption.
In developing countries, malnutrition is more likely to be caused by poor access to a range of nutritious foods or inadequate knowledge.
Research indicates that improving the awareness of nutritious meal choices and establishing long-term habits of healthy eating have a positive effect on cognitive and spatial memory capacity, with potential to increase a student’s ability to process and retain academic information.
Some organizations have begun working with teachers, policymakers, and managed foodservice contractors to mandate improved nutritional content and increased nutritional resources in school cafeterias from primary to university level institutions. Health and nutrition have been proven to have close links with overall educational success.
Better nutrition has been shown to have an impact on both cognitive and spatial memory performance; a study showed those with higher blood sugar levels performed better on certain memory tests.
In another study, those who consumed yogurt performed better on thinking tasks when compared to those that consumed caffeine-free diet soda or confections. Nutritional deficiencies have been shown to have a negative effect on learning behavior in mice as far back as 1951.
Socio-Cultural and Developmental Aspects:
Many factors combine together to affect the health of individuals and communities. Whether people are healthy or not, is determined by their circumstances and environment.
To a large extent, factors such as where we live, the state of our environment, genetics, our income and education level, and our relationships with friends and family all have considerable impacts on health, whereas the more commonly considered factors such as access and use of health care services often have less of an impact. There are many socio- cultural determinants affects the health of individuals.
They are:
i. Income and Social Status – higher income and social status are linked to better health. The greater the gap between the richest and poorest people, the greater the differences in health.
ii. Education – low education levels are linked with poor health, more stress and lower self- confidence.
iii. Physical Environment – safe water and clean air, healthy workplaces, safe houses, communities and roads all contribute to good health.
iv. Employment and Working Conditions – people in employment are healthier, particularly those who have more control over their working conditions
v. Social Support Networks – greater support from families, friends and communities is linked to better health.
vi. Culture – customs and traditions, and the beliefs of the family and community all affect health.
v. Health Services – access and use of services that prevent and treat disease influences health
vi. Gender – Men and women suffer from different types of diseases at different ages.
Dietary Diversity for Good Health:
Food is made up of nutrients. Micronutrients such as vitamins and minerals are needed only in small amounts. Macronutrients such as carbohydrates, protein and fat are needed in larger amounts. The body cannot function properly if one or more nutrients are missing. A healthy and balanced diet provides foods in the right amounts and combinations that are safe and free from disease and harmful substances.
Prevention is better than cure. The earlier a person starts to eat a healthy and balanced diet, the more he or she will stay healthy. Once weight has been lost it may be difficult to regain it because of tiredness and lack of appetite.
Dietary habits are the habitual decisions an individual or culture makes when choosing what foods to eat. The word diet often implies the use of specific intake of nutrition for health or weight-management reasons. Although humans are omnivores, each culture and each person holds some food preferences or some food taboos.
This may be due to personal tastes or ethical reasons. Individual dietary choices may be more or less healthy. Complete nutrition requires ingestion and absorption of vitamins, minerals, and food energy in the form of carbohydrates, proteins, and fats. Dietary habits and choices play a significant role in the quality of life, health and longevity.
A particular diet may be chosen to seek weight loss or weight gain. Changing a subject’s dietary intake, or “going on a diet”, can change the energy balance and increase or decrease the amount of fat stored in our body. Some foods are specifically recommended, or even altered, for conformity to the requirements of a particular diet. These diets are often recommended in conjunction with exercise.
Specific weight loss programs can be harmful to health, while others may be beneficial and can thus be coined as healthy diets. The terms “healthy diet” and “diet for weight management” are often related, as the two promote healthy weight management. Having a healthy diet is a way to prevent health problems, and will provide your body with the right balance of vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients.
Consuming a healthy diet throughout the life course helps to prevent malnutrition in all its forms as well as a range of non-communicable diseases and conditions. But the increased production of processed food, rapid urbanization and changing lifestyles has led to a shift in dietary patterns. People are now consuming more foods high in energy, fats, free sugars or salt/sodium, and many do not eat enough fruit, vegetables and dietary fiber such as whole grains.
The exact make-up of a diversified, balanced and healthy diet will vary depending on individual needs (e.g. age, gender, lifestyle, degree of physical activity), cultural context, locally available foods and dietary customs. But basic principles of what constitute a healthy diet remain the same.
Human Development Index:
The Human Development Index (HDI) is a composite statistic of life expectancy, education, and per capita income indicators, which are used to rank countries into four tiers of human development.
The HDI was developed by Pakistani economist Mahbub ul Haq, is anchored in the Indian Nobel laureate Amartya Sen’s work on human capabilities, often framed in terms of whether people are able to “be” and “do” desirable things in their life and was published by the United Nations Development Program. Every year UNDP ranks countries based on the HDI report released in their annual report. HDI is one of the best tools to keep track of the level of development of a country, as it combines all major social and economic indicators that are responsible for economic development.
3. Essay on Health (500 words):
Health is that balanced condition of the living organism in which the integral, harmonious performance of the vital functions tends to the preservation of the organism and the normal development of the individual. The health of individual people and their communities are affected by a wide range of contributory factors. People’s good or bad health is determined by their environment and situations.
Generally, the context in which an individual lives is of great importance for both his health status and quality of their life. It is increasingly recognized that health is maintained and improved not only through the advancement and application of health science, but also through the efforts and intelligent lifestyle choices of the individual and society.
According to the World Health Organization, the main determinants of health include the social and economic environment, the physical environment, and the person’s individual characteristics and behaviors.
The maintenance and promotion of health is achieved through different combination of physical, mental, and social well-being, together sometimes referred to as the “health triangle.”
Socio Economic Status:
The higher a person’s socioeconomic status is, the more likely he/ she is to enjoy good health. Socioeconomic status affects all members of the family, including newborn babies.
Education:
People with lower levels of education generally have a higher risk of experiencing poorer health. Their levels of stress will most likely be higher, compared to people with higher academic qualifications.
Physical Environment:
If your water is clean and safe, the air you breathe is pure, your workplace is healthy, your house is comfortable and safe, you are more likely to enjoy good health compared to somebody whose water supply is not clean and safe, the air they breathes is contaminated, the workplace is unhealthy, etc.
Culture:
The traditions and customs of a society and how a family responds to them play an important role in people’s health. The impact could be either good or bad for health. The determinants of culture influence the health of individuals’ are- ethnicity, language, religion and spiritual beliefs, gender, socio-economic class, age, sexual orientation, geographic origin, education, upbringing life experience.
Genetic Inheritance:
People’s longevity, general health, and propensity to certain diseases are partly determined by their genetic makeup.
Working Conditions:
Statistics shows that employed are more likely to enjoy better health than people who are unemployed. If you have some control over your working conditions your health will benefit too.
Access and Use of Health Services:
A society that has access and uses good quality health services is more likely to enjoy better health than one that doesn’t. For example, developed countries that have universal health care services have longer life expectancies for their people compared to developed countries that don’t.
Gender:
Men and women are susceptible to some different diseases, conditions and physical experiences, which play a role in the general health.
Disease:
The term disease broadly refers to any condition that impairs the normal functioning of the body. A disease is a particular abnormal condition, a disorder that affects part or all of an organism.
4. Essay on the Effects of Emotions on Health:
Inadequate emotional expression especially of negative feelings can have an adverse effect on the progression of certain types of illness, such as cancer. People who tend to experience negative emotions and who also inhibit self-expression in their social interactions are exhibiting a pattern of behavior recently termed the Type D—for distressed personality type.
Individuals who cope with stress by keeping their negative emotions to themselves are likely to experience suppressed immune systems, greater recurrence of cancer, and higher mortality rates. In contrast, patients who demonstrate positive affect, especially joy, well-being, and happiness—increase the likelihood of recovery.
An intriguing finding is the relation between expression of distress and treatment outcome. Open expression of negative affect and a willingness to fight illness are sometimes associated with greater immune function, decreased recurrence rates, and increased survival time, even among patients at advanced stages of cancer. For example, combative individuals, those who express anger about getting cancer and hostility towards their doctors and family members—often live longer than patients who passively accept their fate and quietly undergo treatment.
Emotion can also play a role in the progression of hypertension, or high blood pressure, a condition in which the pressure within the blood vessels is abnormally high. Prolonged hypertension, when untreated, can result in extensive damage to the entire circulatory system. Indeed, about 30 percent of cardiovascular disease deaths each year are attributable to hypertension. Some evidence suggests that emotional stressors can affect the regulation of blood pressure through neuro-hormonal mechanisms.
For example, anxiety and hostility can increase general arousal and facilitate the release of catecholamine a class of neurotransmitters that play an important role in the sympathetic nervous system. The release of the catecholamine epinephrine has the effect of boosting a person’s overall readiness to act; a rise in blood pressure is part of this overall readiness.
Although the effects of emotional stressors are usually brief, extreme reactivity to anxiety, hostility, and anger may indicate a predisposition to develop hypertension. Not surprisingly, the strongest relations between emotions and blood pressure have been found for unexpressed anger and hostility. Fortunately, research has shown that people can learn to reduce such tendencies.
In one study, Gidron and Davidson (1996) identified a group of participants who scored high on measures of cynical hostility, the harmful component of the Type A behavior pattern. Half of these persons were assigned to an eight-week intervention specifically designed to modify cynical hostility; the other half (the control group) received information about the link between hostility and heart disease and about ways to reduce hostility.
Participants assigned to the intervention condition attended weekly meetings, monitored their hostility daily, and received instruction in the use of specific coping skills; for example, they learned to use relaxation exercises and practiced ways to vent their angry feelings. The participants in the intervention group showed significant improvement on measures of cynical hostility, whereas participants assigned to the control group did not.
5. Essay on Major Achievements of Health Sector:
Following are the major achievement of health sector:
1. National Rural Health Mission:
(i) Large number of medical and paramedical staff has been taken on contract to augment the human resources. During the year 2009-10, about 2475 MBBS doctors, 160 specialists, 7136 ANMs, 2847 staff nurses, 2368 AYUSH doctors and 2184 AYUSH paramedics were appointed.
(ii) Mobile Medical Units increased to 363 districts in 2009-10 from 310 in 2008-09 to provide diagnostic and outpatient care closer to hamlets and villages in remote areas.
(iii) About 50,000 Village Health and Sanitation Committees (VHSCs) set up.
(iv) Under National Programme for Control of Blindness, number of cataract operation performed have registered a significant increase from about 22 lakh operations in 2007-08 to 59 lakh cataract operations in 2009-10. The Reproductive and Child Health Programme and National Disease Control Programmes are components of NRHM.
2. Reproductive and Child Health:
(i) Under Navjaat Shishu Suraksha Karyakram (NSSK-New born care programme) launched on 15th of September, 2009, district level trainers have been developed for all the erstwhile EAG States and Jammu & Kashmir, while State level trainers have been developed in Non-EAG States. 1400 trainers have already been trained.
(ii) Under Janani Suraksha Yojana (JSY), a safe motherhood intervention for promoting institutional delivery, the number of beneficiaries increased from 7.39 lakh in 2005-06 to about 1 crore in 2009-10, registering an increase of 10 lakh during 2009- 10.
3. Communicable Disease Control and Prevention:
(i) For the first time in the country, National Sample Survey to estimate burden of Leprosy is being taken up.
(ii) DOTS-Plus programme for management of Multi Drug Resistant (MDR)-Tuberculosis (TB) was initiated in 4 more states bringing up the total to 10 States.
(iii) Up gradation of National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) as Centre of Excellence of Public Health has been taken up.
(iv) State of art Blood Banks are being set up in four Metropolitan cities of New Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai and Chennai at an estimated cost of Rs.468 crore.
(v) State of art Plasma Fractionation centre is being set up in Chennai at a cost of Rs.250 crore to produce blood components currently being imported.
4. Non-Communicable Disease Control and Prevention:
(i) To increase the availability of trained personnel required for mental health care, 7 regional institutes have been funded against the 11 to be undertaken during 11th Plan for production of clinical psychologists, psychiatrists, psychiatric nursing and psychiatric social workers.
(ii) National Policies for Geriatric Care, cardio vascular & diabetes and cancer finalised for a total outlay of about Rs.1519 crore.
(i) To increase the number of doctors across the country and for opening more medical colleges, norms relating to requirement and land and infrastructure have been rationalised in order to attract more entrepreneurs, particularly in under-served and difficult areas.
(ii) Infrastructure requirements for setting up new medical colleges have been rationalized and requirement of bed strength and patient occupancy has been relaxed.
(iii) Companies registered in India have been permitted, for the first time, to set up medical colleges.
(iv) To increase availability of doctors, ceiling for MBBS admissions has been raised in Government colleges from 150 to 250 depending on bed strength.
(v) To encourage Government medical officers and fresh MBBS graduates to serve in remote, difficult and inaccessible areas of the country.
(vi) To overcome the acute shortage of faculty in medical colleges and specialists and super specialists in hospitals.
(vii) To overcome shortage of faculty in medical colleges at different levels, i.e., Assistant Professor, Associate Professor and Professor level, the requirement of number of years of service stipulated in the Medical Council of India (MCI) regulations in each of the three grades has been reduced by one year, i.e., from 4 years to 3 years.
(viii) Setting up of one national institute and 8 regional institutes of paramedical sciences across the country is under approval for an estimated cost of Rs.1000 crore.
(ix) To encourage entrepreneurs establish more AYUSH institutions the requirement of land, infrastructure and faculty for the establishment of AYUSH colleges and hospitals have been further rationalised, including reduction in land requirement from 10 acres to 5 acres.
6. Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana:
(i) For setting up of AIIMS like institutions, environmental clearance was obtained for hospitals and medical colleges to be set up at Bhubaneswar, Patna, Jodhpur, Rishikesh, Raipur and Bhopal sites in 2009. Hostel construction in all the places is at advance stage of completion.
(ii) Works for Medical College Complex for all six sites have been awarded. Award of work for construction of hospital complex is under finalization and work likely to start by June, 2010 to be completed in two years.
(iii) For completion of construction of college and hospital before the prescribed time, an incentive up to Rs.12.5 crore shall be payable to contractor. However, for delay beyond the prescribed time of up to 6 months, penalty up to Rs.25 crore shall be levied and for delay beyond six months, contractor shall be liable to be blacklisted for a specified period.
7. Primary Health Care:
During the Eleventh Five Year Plan, major focus is given on NRHM initiatives. Efforts are being made for restructuring and reorganizing all health facilities below district level into the Three Tier Rural Primary Health Care System. These will serve the populations in a well-defined area and have referral linkages with each other. Population-centric norms, which continue to drive the provisioning of health infrastructure, will be modified.
These will be replaced with flexible norms comprising habitation-based needs, community-based needs, and disease pattern-based needs. Steps have also been taken to reorganize Urban Primary Health Care Institutions and make them responsible for the health care of people living in a defined geographic area, particularly slum dwellers.
8. Secondary and Tertiary Health Care:
Secondary and Tertiary health care is receiving attention. There is an urgent need to take a fresh look at how public and private sector can be better utilized during the Eleventh Five Year Plan. The NRHM addresses these issues through a few strategies. Priorities are being given to strategies involving PPPs, risk pooling mechanisms, and cross subsidization.
District hospitals, which play a key role in providing health services to the poor, need substantial improvement in infrastructure and other facilities to perform their role more effectively. This would also be a key intermediate step in the health strategy, till the vision of health care through PHCs and community health centres is fully realized. The Plan will also complete setting up of 6 AIIMS-like institutions, upgrading 13 existing medical institutes under the NRHM scheme.
6. Essay on the Objectives of Health Sector during 11th Plan:
Objectives of health sector during 11th Plan are as follows:
(i) Reducing Maternal Mortality Ratio (MMR) to 1 per 1,000 live births.
(ii) Reducing Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) to 28 per 1,000 live births.
(iii) Reducing malnutrition among children in the age group 0-3 year to half its present level.
(iv) Reducing anaemia among women and girls by 50 per cent.
(v) Raising the sex ratio in the age group 0-6 years to 935 by 2011-12, and to 950 by 2016-17.
(vi) Filaria/Microfilaria Reduction Rate- 70 per cent by 2010, 80 per cent by 2012 and elimination by 2015.
(vii) Dengue Mortality Reduction Rate- 50 per cent by 2010 and sustaining at that level until 2012.
(viii) Cataract operations: Increase to 46 lakhs by 2012.
(ix) Leprosy Prevalence Rate- Reduce from 1.8 per 10,000 in 2005 to less than 1 per 10,000 thereafter.
(x) Tuberculosis DOTS series- Maintain 85 per cent cure rate through entire mission period and also sustain planned case detection rate. In terms of systems improvements the NRHM targets were quite moderate.
(xi) Upgrade all PHCs into 24×7 PHCs by the year 2010.
(xii) Upgrading all Community Health Centres to Indian Public Health Standards.
(xiii) Engaging 4,00,000 female Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs).
Strengthening Existing Health System:
There is need to shift to decentralization of functions to hospital units/health centres and local bodies. The States need to move away from the narrow focus on the implementation of budgeted programmes and vertical schemes. They need to develop systems that comprehensively address the health needs of all citizens.
Thus, in order to improve the health care services in the country, the Eleventh Five Year Plan will insist on Integrated District Health Plans and Block Specific Health Plans. It will mandate involvement of all health related sectors and emphasize partnership with PRIs, local bodies, communities, NGOs, Voluntary and Civil Society Organizations.
7. Essay on Health is Wealth – Universal Immunization Program (UIP):
Universal Immunization (is the process by which an individual’s immune system becomes fortified against an agent) Program is a vaccination program launched by the Government of India in 1985. It became a part of Child Survival and Safe Motherhood Program in 1992 and is currently one of the key areas under National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) since 2005.
The program consists of vaccination for seven diseases – tuberculosis, diphtheria, pertussis (whooping cough), tetanus, poliomyelitis, measles and Hepatitis B. Hepatitis B was added to the UIP in 2007. Thus, UIP has 7 vaccine preventable diseases in the program.
On 2014 it was announced that four vaccines will be added to the program, namely rotavirus, rubella and Japanese encephalitis, as well as the injectable polio vaccine.
Vaccine:
It is one of the largest in the world in terms of quantities of vaccine used, the number of beneficiaries, the number of Immunisation session organised, the geographical spread and diversity of areas covered.
The national policy of Immunization of all children during the first year of life with DPT, OPV, BCG to complete the series of primary vaccination before reaching the age of one year was adopted in 1978 with the lunching of EPI to increase the Immunization coverage in infancy to 80%.
Yuva:
Youth Unite for Victory on AIDS (YUVA) is a plan of action prepared by India’s Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports (MYA&S) in collaboration with the National AIDS Control Organization (NACO) and 7 local youth-oriented organizations. Launched in June 2006, this national initiative is designed to reach out to adolescents and youth in all parts of the country with HIV/AIDS prevention information and action messages.
i. Ensure that by 2010 all young people in India have accurate information, skills and access to HIV prevention services/facilities in a conducive, safe and supportive environment.
ii. Reaching out to young people at the highest risk of new infection, such as migrant and mobile youth workers, is a program priority.
YUVA is Youth Unite for Victory against AIDS, a five-year government action plan to create awareness among 450 million youth and adolescents in the country about AIDS. With India topping the chart of number of HIV infected people; the ministry of youth affairs’ move is all the more urgent. “AIDS can particularly be a youth problem.
The focus of the program is awareness that prevention is the key to tackle the situation,” Under the plan, youth volunteers will take pledge on a seven-point program.” The program will create awareness about HIV/AIDS, child marriage, gender equality with focus on dowry and sex determination tests and empowerment for livelihood.
8. Essay on the Epidemiological Perspectives of Health:
Epidemiology is the cornerstone of public health, and shapes policy decisions and evidence-based practice by identifying risk factors for disease and targets for preventive healthcare.
Epidemiology, literally meaning “the study of what is upon the people”, is derived from Greek epi, meaning “upon, among”, demos, meaning “people, district”, and logos, meaning “study, word, discourse”.
Epidemiology is concerned with the incidence of disease in populations and does not address the question of the cause of an individual’s disease. This question, sometimes referred to as specific causation, is beyond the domain of the science of epidemiology Epidemiology has its limits at the point where an inference is made that the relationship between an agent and a disease is causal (general causation) and where the magnitude of excess risk attributed to the agent has been determined.
Epidemiology has developed a strong role as a “basic” science and a position of growing respect among academic researchers. This role has fundamental importance for public health, since the best opportunities to prevent disease and improve health often come from advances in basic understanding of the causes of disease, the development of new methods to study them, and the assessment of preventive and control measures.
9. Essay on Disease Burden and Surveillance:
Disease burden is the impact of a health problem as measured by financial cost, mortality, morbidity, or other indicators. It is often quantified in terms of quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) or disability- adjusted life years (DALYs), both of which quantify the number of years lost due to disease (YLDs).
The environmental burden of disease is defined as the number of DALYs that can be attributed to environmental factors. These measures allow for comparison of disease burdens, and have also been used to forecast the possible impacts of health interventions. By 2014 DALYs per head were “40% higher in low-income and middle-income regions.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has provided set of detailed guidelines for measuring disease burden at the local or national level. The public health impacts of air pollution, noise pollution, and radiation can be quantified using DALYs.
For each disease, a DALY is calculated as–
DALYs = number of people with the disease x duration of the disease (or loss of life expectancy in the case of mortality) x severity (varying from 0 for perfect health to 1 for death).
Surveillance is the monitoring of the behavior, activities, or other changing information, usually of people for the purpose of influencing, managing, directing, or protecting them.
Disease Surveillance:
Disease surveillance is an epidemiological practice by which the spread of disease is monitored in order to establish patterns of progression.
Public health surveillance provides the scientific and factual database essential to informed decision making and appropriate public health action. The key objective of surveillance is to provide information to guide interventions. The public health objectives and actions needed to make successful interventions determine the design and implementation of surveillance systems.
The main objectives of disease surveillance is to predict, observe, and minimize the harm caused by outbreak, epidemic situations, as well as increase knowledge about which factors contribute to such circumstances. The World Health Organization is the lead agency for coordinating global response to major diseases. The WHO maintains Web sites for a number of diseases, and has active teams in many countries where these diseases occur.
Various public health surveillances are listed below:
1. Active Surveillance:
Active surveillance provides the most accurate and timely information, but it is also expensive.
2. Passive Surveillance:
Passive surveillance is a relatively inexpensive strategy to cover large areas, and it provides critical information for monitoring a community’s health. However, because passive surveillance depends on people in different institutions to provide data, data quality and timeliness are difficult to control.
3. Routine Health Information System:
A passive system in which regular reports about diseases and programs are completed by public health staff members, hospitals, and clinics.
4. Health Information and Management System:
A passive system by which routine reports about financial, logistic, and other processes involved in the administration of the public health and clinical systems can be used for surveillance.
5. Categorical Surveillance:
An active or passive system that focuses on one or more diseases or behaviors of interest to an intervention program. These systems are useful for program managers. However, they may be inefficient at the district or local level, at which staff may need to fill out multiple forms on the same patient (that is, the HIV program, the tuberculosis program, the sexually transmitted infections program, and the Routine Health Information System).
6. Integrated Surveillance:
A combination of active and passive systems using a single infrastructure that gathers information about multiple diseases or behaviors of interest to several intervention programs (for example -, a health facility-based system may gather information on multiple infectious diseases and injuries).
7. Syndromic Surveillance:
An active or passive system that uses case definitions that are based entirely on clinical features without any clinical or laboratory diagnosis (for example – collecting the number of cases of diarrhea rather than cases of cholera, or “rash illness” rather than measles). Because syndromic surveillance is inexpensive and is faster than systems that require laboratory confirmation, it is often the first kind of surveillance begun in a developing country. In the specialized area of surveillance.
8. Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS):
An active system of repeated surveys that measure behaviors that are known to cause disease or injury (for example, tobacco or alcohol use, unprotected sex, or lack of physical exercise). Because the aim of many intervention program strategies is to prevent disease by preventing unhealthy behavior, these surveys provide a direct measure of their effect in the population, often long before the anticipated health effects are expected. These surveys are useful for providing timely measures of program effectiveness for both communicable and non-communicable disease interventions.
10. Essay on Health Scenario:
The voice of wisdom and experience tells us that one of the important things in life is to be healthy. Good health and long life have been the most prized goals of mankind. Health is an important entitlement that enhances capabilities of the masses, raises quality of life of the people and reduces losses caused by absenteeism, saves resources otherwise spent on treating illness and enables more optimal use of resources.
Good health raises the income levels and consumption standards thereby reducing the poverty. In fact, the most fundamental aspect of human life is health which unfortunately cannot be given or distributed. It is to be actively acquired or won. It forms an integral component of overall socioeconomic development of any nation.
It is a matter of concern and care to certain sensitive members of family and society, irrespective of caste, creed, and country, culture etc., the concept of health keeps changing from time to time and of course varies from person to person. For example, some people say absence of disease is a healthy condition, some even accept obese is a good state of body in comparison to normal or ideal weight.
So, for a lay man there is no agreed definition of health though there has been many definitions. However, the most accepted scientific definition put forth by World Health Organization states- “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well- being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.”
The definition of health projects four different dimensions – physical, mental, social and spiritual. A person who enjoys health in these four planes is said to be in a state of positive health.
The development of health is a holistic process influenced by the overall growth and development of social, cultural, economic, environmental factors. The positive health depends on many supportive services like nutrition, water supply, public health, sanitation, medical services etc. the outcome of all these services depends mostly on public health policy that provides logical framework and rationality of decision making for the achievement of health of the people.
India’s first formal National Health Policy (NHP) was formulated in 1983 although long before, the Government of India had taken the initiative on the eve of independence to start a well-structured and comprehensive health service with a sound basic infrastructure laying equal importance to provision of safe drinking water, adequate housing and sanitation.
Health is considered to be that part of the human welfare which depends on the normal functioning of the body. Good health is crucial part of well-being. The success of any development strategy depends largely on the extent of which human resources are developed in terms of skills, education, health and well-being. Amongst these, the level of health is vital input for economic development.
The development of human resource is vital from the point of view of economic welfare. And for human resource development, the development of health facilities and services is an essential prerequisite. Health affects every aspects of human behaviour whether one feels energetic and strong or weak, tired or in pain, working hard or making only a show of working/thinking hopefully through few possibilities or resting now and postponing issues until tomorrow, all these turn closely upon one’s level of health.
In 1948 the general assembly of the UNO adopted the universal declaration of human rights. Accordingly the right of health and medical services are vital and are the fundamental rights of every human being. Health is the right of every citizen. It is an integral part of national development.
Now a days it is widely recognized that human capital plays a dominant role in the context of economic development and health is an important component of human capital. In fact, Health status exercises profound influence on human resource development and effective utilization of human resources. It is natural to expect a rise in the health status of the people, by increasing and improving the health facilities with more emphasis on the preventive aspects and rural health care.
Every health programme must pay sufficient attention to the people in the rural areas, slum dwellers in urban areas and vulnerable sections of the society like women and children. It is said that health is wealth. Sound health is the abode of a tranquil mind which is of immense importance for doing anything noteworthy.