Public health
From Ask in Wiki
Due to the busy lives that people live nowadays, health is sometimes made to take the backseat. Little do people know that when a person gets sick, it is not only that person who gets affected, but the people around him as well. Public health experts are delving into this and doing preventive measures in order to diminish, if not eliminate, the threats to public health.
Public health is concerned with the threats to the overall health of a community based on an analysis of the health of the population. The population referred to can be just a small community or whole continents. As defined by the World Health Organization, health is "A state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity." Public health experts, though, contest that this definition happens to be incomplete. For an individual to be healthy, other factors must also be taken into consideration, such as intellectual, nutritional, and spiritual. Social and behavioral health are likewise important sub-fields of public health.
Issues such as obesity, HIV/AIDS, diabetes, infant mortality, smoking, alcoholism, drug addiction, and violence are just some threats to the health of a community. Public health experts are concerned about these issues, and advocate and implement preventive measures so that people would be more knowledgeable about these topics and take caution. Though some of the aforementioned issues require medication, therapy, and counseling, a lot of problems can be solved and a lot of lives can be saved simply by knowing how to eat right and having good hygiene. Most countries have public health officials and government agencies made specifically to address these issues and provide health care services. Nowadays, most governments are able to recognize the importance of public health, which puts prevention over cure. However, it is still less funded compared to medicine.
