Assignment #3: Changing the Social Determinants of Health Week 5: What are some negative effects of industrial production on our food supply? How does our social location affect our access to good food? Industrialized food production in today’s society poses many risks to the average consumer. Manufacturers of illness are constantly producing synthetic and processed foods that are entering our bodies and having affects on morbidity and mortality rates (Abramson, 2012). These processed foods are made increasingly convenient to those that are living a busy lifestyle and in low income areas as they are easily obtainable and make healthier foods scarcely available. Our social location, a result of our income, affects the availability of healthy foods and clean water. Low income areas have more access to cheaper and easily accessible processed foods. Nutritional implications are caused by consumption of these foods such as cardiac problems, diabetes or malnutrition (McIntyre & Rondeau, 2009). Food is a daily necessity worldwide and our contaminated food supply continues to grow as it poses many of these health risks. Organic fresh food availability is vital in order to preserve healthy living. Social movements such as Canadian Biotechnology Action Network are available to protest against genetically modified food production. The Toronto Mobile Food Market and Canadian Association of Food Banks provide healthy fresh foods to low income areas and are incremental steps taken to solve the issue locally. Week 6: How does inadequate housing negatively impact our health? What other aspects of our surroundings should we consider? Adequate shelter is a necessity to safe and healthy living however many Canadians are finding i... ... middle of paper ... ...phael (ed.) Social Determinants of Health—Second Edition (Toronto: Canadian Scholars Press) pp. 114-124 Smylie, Janet (2009) Chapter nineteen—The health of Aboriginal peoples, in Dennis Raphael (ed.) Social Determinants of Health—Second Edition (Toronto: Canadian Scholars Press) pp. 280-301 Tremblay, D-G (2009) Chapter five—Precarious work and the labour market, in Dennis Raphael (ed.) Social Determinants of Health—Second Edition (Toronto: Canadian Scholars Press) pp. 75-87 Vancoe, C., Pauly, B., & Lailberte, S. (2011) Chapter seventeen—Intersectionality justice, and influencing policy, in Olena Hankivsky (ed.) Health Inequities in Canada: Intersectional Frameworks and Practices (Vancouver: UBC Press) pp. 331-348 Welcome to the City of Toronto website. (n.d.). Housing & Homelessness Services. Retrieved December 2, 2013, from http://www.toronto.ca/housing/
Food is an essential part of everyday life without it one could not survive. Every day we make choices on what we put in to our bodies. There are countless varieties of food to choose from to meet the diverse tastes of the increasing population. Almost all food requires a label explaining the ingredients and the nutritional value allowing consumers to make informed decisions on what they are consuming. However, many may not be considering where that food is coming from or how it has been produced. Unfortunately, there is more to food than meets the eye. Since 1992, “ the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ruled, based on woefully limited data, that genetically modified foods were ‘substantially equivalent’ to their non-GM counterparts” (Why to Support Labeling). GM food advocates have promised to create more nutritious food that will be able to grow in harsh climate conditions and eventually put an end to world hunger in anticipation of the growing population. There is very little evidence to support these claims and study after study has proven just the opposite. GM crops are not only unsafe to consume, but their growing practices are harmful to the environment, and multinational corporations are putting farmers out of business.
In most societies there are variations in the levels of wealth, material possession, power, and authority amongst individuals. These variables are usually related to one’s occupation, race and the diversity of access to things like education and health care. All of these resources impact individual status in society, and take part in classifying people into social classes. Precise social class is difficult to identify, as it consists of two fundamental aspects. The objective aspect pertains to one’s occupation, race, age, and other solid facts; meanwhile the subjective aspect portrays one’s values, behaviorisms, and his/her way of life.
While it is true that housing is correlated with positive outcomes in the homeless population, it does not account for supportive services that this population may also need. Housing is one plan of action for preventing homelessness, but it does not solve the problem. Persisting health problems may prevent an individual from ever reaching housing stability for them a permanent house would not be beneficial if the problem is their health. Housing without supportive services cannot end homelessness.3,4 Providing housing for the homeless is a measure taken after people have experienced the trauma of losing their home. Intervention efforts should be concentrated on preventing the loss of homes, and safety that can ultimately influence a person 's health
Impact of Economic stability with my health is that I went to a community clinic only when I needed vaccines and only when my pain was bad would I go to the hospital and because I did not have insurance not many in-depth studies could be done. Impact of Education is not being aware of how important it is having a primary care physician, getting yearly physicals and not knowing what health insurance really is or how to seek access to one. Impact of health and health care again is not having enough knowledge of how to seek one or understand how it really works to actually look for a specialist or be referred to one. Impact of neighborhood and built environment domain I think had actually a positive impact on my health because my mom never has liked eating out and always cooked for us healthy meals because it’s what my dad worked for to give food for us on the table and always gave us vitamins to make sure we would stay healthy. Our housing was good family bond, very tight family setting where there was always communication between us, our neighborhood was a safe neighborhood with a low crime rate. Impact on social and community context had on my health was because there was a language barrier there was a lack of social interaction perhaps being a loss to our health in not knowing enough about the different resources out there.
Addiction can be defined as the use of a drug or stimulus that has unreasonably taken control of a person’s behaviour. (Scollo & Winstanley 2012). It is a serious and complex issue hence the social determinants of health need to be addressed to the community and be used to guide nurses with knowledge to use in the nursing practice. Addiction to drug use has contributed to thousands of deaths, social and family disruption, violence, crime and workplace issues. In 2013, over 40% of Australians consumed alcohol, smoked tobacco or used illicit drugs at risky levels making them more likely to become addicted. (Claydon et. al 2014) The population in remote areas were found to be, twice as likely to have an addiction to tobacco, alcohol and drugs
The 2009 movie Food Inc. describes the major role that food production plays within many lives. This movie revealed that there is a very small variety of companies that consumers purchase their food from. These few companies actually control what is out on the shelves and what we put into our bodies. These companies have changed food production into a food production business. Many of these companies experiment with ways to create large quantities of food at low production costs to result in an enormous amount of profit for themselves. Some of the production cost cuts also result in less healthy food for the population. Instead of worrying about the health of the population, the companies are worried about what will make them the most money.
A person’s health along with the health of a community are influenced heavily by the social determinants of health. These determinants create a strong foundation for a healthy and proper development of a community (Public Health Agency of Canada, 2013). Further, a proper foundation will allow the children within the community to develop properly, which will foster their potential for intellectual and physical intelligence. This paper will explore the effects of healthy childhood development, personal health practices and coping skills, health services and income and social statuses with in the Maple Leaf neighbourhood. Further, this paper will explore how the above social determinants of health directly affect the students of St. Fidelis school. Lastly, this paper will explain how the rise in cavities within these children is an issue as well as approached to overcome this issue.
Genetically modified food’s, or GMOs, goal is to feed the world's malnourished and undernourished population. Exploring the positive side to GMOs paints a wondrous picture for our planet’s future, although careful steps must be taken to ensure that destruction of our ecosystems do not occur. When GMOs were first introduced into the consumer market they claimed that they would help eliminate the world’s food crisis by providing plants that produced more and were resistant to elemental impacts like droughts and bacterial contaminants, however, production isn’t the only cause for the world’s food crisis. Which is a cause for concern because the population on the earth is growing and our land and ways of agriculture will not be enough to feed everyone sufficiently. No simple solutions can be found or applied when there are so many lives involved. Those who are hungry and those who are over fed, alike, have to consider the consequences of Genetically Modified Organisms. Food should not be treated like a commodity it is a human necessity on the most basic of levels. When egos, hidden agendas, and personal gains are folded into people's food sources no one wins. As in many things of life, there is no true right way or wrong way to handle either of the arguments and so many factors are involved that a ‘simple’ solution is simply not an option.
There are different issues that affect the health of people. Whether they become healthy is dependent on their situation and where they live. Factors including where we live, education, level of income, genetics, access to health care services and much more has a significant influence on our health. The determinants of health are factors which influence a person’s state of health.
Social determinants of health (SDOH) are increasingly becoming a major problem of Public Health around the World. The impact of resources and material deprivation among people and populations has resulted in an increase in mortality rate on a planetary scale. Social determinants of health are defined as the personal, social, economic and the environmental conditions which determines the health status of an individual or population (Gardner, 2013). Today’s society is characterized by inequalities in health, education, income and many other factors which as a result is becoming a burden for Public Health around the world. Research studies have shown that the conditions in which people live and work strongly influenced their health. Individuals with high levels of education and fall within the high income bracket turn to have stable jobs, live in the best neighborhood and have access to quality health care system than individuals who have low education and fall with the low income bracket. This paper is to explain different social determinants of health and how they play ...
Over the years, the social determinants of health (SDOH) have been receiving more attention due to its importance in determining peoples’ health access, health quality and health outcome. The social determinants of health have been described by various scholars as the situation or environmental condition in which people are born, or where they grow, live and work; unfortunately these conditions have continued to affect and determine people’s ability to access proper care.1-5 In other words, the SDOH continues to consciously and unconsciously influence people’s access to most opportunities in life including access to healthcare services both in developed and developing countries.2 This issues have continue to deteriorate in most developing countries increasing people’s susceptibility to multi-morbidity among different age groups, with a slight increase among the elderly.6
Health as a Social Construction In my essay, I aim to find out why social construction affects the health of our society. Ill health may be defined as 'a bodily or mental state that is deemed undesirable'. This means that health is the condition of the body both physically and mentally. Social construction of health refers to the way health varies from one society to another.
The health of an individual and their communities is affected by several elements which combine together. Whether an individual is healthy or not, is determined by their circumstances and environment.1 To a greater extent, factors such as where an individual lives, their relationships with family and friends, the state of their environment, income, genetics and level of education all have significant impacts on health, however the more frequently considered factors such as access and use of health care facilities regularly have less of an impact.6 Determinants of health is a term which was introduced in the 1970s as part of a broader analysis of research and policy on public health. Researchers argued that there was a lot of attention and too much expenditure on health being dedicated to individuals and their illnesses, and little or no investment in populations and their health. It was decided that public health should be more concerned with social policies and social determinants than with health facilities and the outcomes of diseases.7 The determinants of health include social and economic environment, physical environment and an individual’s behaviour and characteristics. The environment of an individual determines their health, holding responsible an individual for having poor health or acknowledging them for good health is inappropriate. Individuals are not likely to be able to control several of the determinants of health. These determinants that make individuals healthy or not include the factors above, and numerous others.6
Most people aren’t familiar with ways our government is trying to lower health care costs of the homeless by putting them in houses, here is their chance to learn. “Housing First” approaches are aimed at reducing the number of homeless people in metropolitan cities, especially in USA and Canada. In Tulsa, the Mental Health Association operates housing models that are successful using the Housing First approach, but only with a success rate of around nine percent. These programs are able to help people achieve self-sufficiency. Special consideration is given to people who have mental illnesses. The main advantage of the approach is it makes an efficient use of the existing systems and services, and then eliminates the need for new ones. The approach has been said to lead to better quality of life, less alcohol and substance use among the beneficiaries, and less use of emergency services by the beneficiaries. Despite all of the advantages and purposes, the program has many challenges that make one think it’s not as successful as first projected. This could lead to program loss or the challenges being dealt with appropriately. If the government wants to use money to help end homelessness, they should put it towards resources and organizations that can, not towards homes where the homeless go to be ignored.
Social determinants of health has been a large topic for many years and can have a positive and negative effect on individuals, families and communities. (World Health Organisation, 2009) The social determinants of health are the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work and age, including the health system. These circumstances are shaped by the distribution of money, power and resources at global, national and local levels, which are themselves influenced by policy choices. Social determinants have many factors and in this essay education will be the main social determinant of health discussed and how this could have an impact on the physical and mental sides of health.