[ad_1]
Well maintained parks, clean air and clean water, safe and friendly neighborhoods: These factors and many other factors beyond our control contribute to health.
WIN Initiative / Getty Images / WIN RM Initiative
hide legend
activate the legend
WIN Initiative / Getty Images / WIN RM Initiative
Well maintained parks, clean air and clean water, safe and friendly neighborhoods: These factors and many other factors beyond our control contribute to health.
WIN Initiative / Getty Images / WIN RM Initiative
The typical American conversation about health is about personal choice as a key factor: the foods we choose to eat, the number of steps we take every day, the doctors we visit, and the medications we take. According to epidemiologist Sandro Galea, this way of thinking is bad.
In his new book, Well: What do we need when we talk about health, The Dean of the School of Public Health at Boston University said that not only did the belief in the power of personal choice fail to solve the health crisis in America, but it also diverted us from the real ones. underlying problems to the poor health of our country.
"We can choose the food we eat, but our options are limited by what we can afford and by the type of food available to buy near us," he writes. "These factors, in turn, depend on the quality of our neighborhood and the size of our revenues, which depend on broader socio-economic forces over which we have little control."
The notion that one creates good health simply by choosing to do so facilitates the stigma of obesity, drug addiction and other chronic diseases as a byproduct of laziness or d & # 39; a moral weakness, further obscuring their real causes, he warns.
"By telling yourself that you should do more exercise when you are worried about getting out of your house and getting shot at, when there is no park around you that offers a nice place to walking, when you work at two minimum wage jobs and you can not afford a gym membership is simply nonsense, "he told NPR.
According to Galea, understanding that our health is a product of the world around us serves to eliminate "our reflexive stigma".
And it's important, he says, because the stigma itself is known to erode self-esteem and self-confidence, which causes social isolation that can trigger others. health problems.
Galea says his book represents the culmination of 20 years of study and public health work. He was motivated by the huge gap between US spending on health care and the relatively low return on that investment.
"Part of my job is to make the world understand what it really takes to generate health," Galea said.
As he mentions early in the book, the United States spends huge sums of $ 3.3 trillion in health care, according to 2016 federal figures. Yet, life expectancy in the United States – which is the lowest of all comparable nations – has actually declined in recent years. He points out that the lifespan of a baby born in the United States is now five years younger on average than if that baby was born in Japan, a country that spends half of what we do to health, per person.
"There is no other area in which we spend more than our peers and we get less," says Galea. "Would you buy a smartphone if it cost you 40% more than the nearest competitor and if your phone was not working as well at 40%? The answer is no, you would not do it."
To improve the overall physical and mental health of the country, Galea said we need to understand that many factors that may seem to have little connection to health are actually driving it.
"The goal we are adopting has a great impact on how we invest our resources and tackle this problem," said Galea.
He says we need to start talking more about neglected factors that affect health. These include topics familiar to public health students – poverty, environment and politics – and others more surprising, including the core human values that Galea believes deserve more attention. Key health factors should be careful to include:
Recognize the past
In order to correct the flaws in the systems and policies we have created, we must recognize the powerful influences of the past, writes Galea. On the individual level, a person's past plays a role in shaping his current health, he says. And at the national level, that means understanding how history affects us today. For example, says Galea, we can trace back to slavery some roots of the differences in health and average life span of black Americans today compared to white Americans. "These health gaps are neither random nor inevitable," writes Galea. "They are a consequence of history."
See the power in one place
It's not hard to understand that neighborhoods and the environment – air quality, water quality, housing, sanitation and infrastructure – affect our health and well-being . But Galea says that the influence of the place is not limited to the physical environment. A community is made up of "cultural, economic and political factors" that can have a real impact on health, he says, including "the economic opportunities we have … the extent to which we invest in reducing violence we invest in equitable opportunities for people of all genders. "
Understand that no one is an island
Galea writes about the importance of social interactions to combat loneliness and isolation, conditions that increase the risk of depression, addiction and suicide. He says this is especially true for older, sicker Americans because age and disability contribute to social isolation. As the world's population ages, "it will become increasingly important to create opportunities for social engagement from generation to generation," he said.
Cultivate humility
Recognizing what we do not know about health and medicine is just as important as what we know. Humility, says Galea, reminds us that health is not lived in isolation and that improving the lives of those around us could be just as important to improving health as the next step forward. scientist. "We must have the humility to accept that there is not only one thing to do, but many things to do," he said. .
Deepen compassion
Galea wants to replace acts of empathy in the short term with a compassion that attacks the root causes of suffering – which "envisions and aspires to a better world". Empathy might inspire us to help cover someone's medical expenses or donate to the victims of a hurricane, but we "always stay in place of the structures that create the disease," he writes. He advocates considering collective well-being as a responsibility that we should all share. "It's centered on the compassionate version of Martin Luther King," says Galea, "which consists of not throwing a coin at a beggar, but asking why he is a beggar at the start."
Change perspective on death
A change in attitude towards death could help us live better, according to Galea. We must accept the inevitability of death and then strive to "die in good health," he says. "Because once you and I say that we value healthy living for as long as possible, we must stop investing huge sums into terminal treatments that contribute nothing. to extend the quality of life, not to mention longevity "
Galea predicts that a change in the conversation about health in the United States will require a local approach beginning with a change in the way we talk about health with friends and family. with the election of local, state, and national leaders who better understand what is needed for health in the United States; and by supporting a private sector that is accountable not only to its shareholders, but also to the "common good in the world" (…), in order to generate health for its employees and for the world that makes them. ;surrounded".
"I think if we all do that," says Galea, "the transformation of how we talk about health will happen sooner than we think."
[ad_2]
Source link