Good health is an essential factor to the well being of every individual. It served as a prerequisite for a person to be a productive citizen of ones’ community and eventually ones’ country. The government acknowledged the impetus position that good health has in the society, which is why it addressed such need by establishing a public health system. The United Sates of America also has its own public health care system that operates based upon core functions and the corresponding essential services rendered.
However, the American public health system still needs to be analyze in order to assess the areas that needs improvement as well its capability to handle biological threats. According to the Institute of Medicine (n. d. ), “Public health is what we, as a society, do collectively to assure the conditions for people to be healthy” (cited in Belovich-Faust & Ligi, n. d. ). The success of the idea of public health is greatly dependent upon the participation of all individuals especially within a particular community.
This is clearly seen in the implementation of the core functions of public health, which are: Assessment, Policy Development, and Assurance (Dato, n. d. ). In order to accomplished these functions, the participation of the local community is very much needed because their input is very essential so that the pressing problems could be assessed. The necessary policy to addressed health problems as well as assuring that the services are rendered are heavily reliant on the active participation of the local stakeholders. The American public health system has evolved throughout the years.
Nonetheless, there are still some changes that could be done in order to enhanced its efficacy. One of the most notable things that should be reformed is the disparity and consistency in the standards of the public health system among states. The policies implemented by local governments are based upon the laws that are created in the state level, which is the reason why public health system tends to vary from one state to another. Based on the report of the Commonwealth Fund, there is a great disparity in the quality of care delivered, access to services, insurance costs, as well as health outcomes among the states in America.
This could be attributed to the lack of a unified or standardized law that would describe what are the requirements for a quality public health system. A good solution to such dilemma is for the federal government to create a law that would specify the standards of what public health system should be and implement it to the various states within the country. According to Belovich-Faust and Ligi (n. d. ), the elements that put people at risk for injuries, as well as infectious and chronic diseases have no boundaries, which mean that the distinction among states is transcended by health problems.
This is the reason why it would be a appropriate to set a minimum standard. A standard that could still be modified by the local level according to their needs without undermining the minimum requirements stated. Based on the Surgeon General’s report, one of the most pressing health problems of America today is obesity. This burdensome dilemma is seen through premature death and disability, lost in productivity, as well as social stigmatization. This disease is caused by many factors such as: genetic, metabolic, behavioral, environmental, cultural, and socioeconomic.
Among these aforementioned causes the greatest contributors are the behavioral and environmental influences, which has more opportunity in being prevented through actions and interventions of the public health system. One of the most effective ways to addressed the problem of obesity is to inform the people of the proper behavior in order to prevent it, like giving the necessary guidelines about their diet as well as their whole lifestyle. In doing so, the traditional method of giving pamphlets as well as community lectures is not that effective anymore.
A good way to improve this is by inviting famous speakers, which have a first hand experience of what it is like to be obese and how he/she was able to get over it. It is more convincing for the patients to believe and be inspired by someone who actually went through the same thing they are experiencing. Furthermore, inviting someone famous would also solved the problem of lack of attendance or participation coming from the people in the community because inviting a famous personality would surely attract their attention.
Prevention is better than cure, which is why the root causes of obesity should be properly given attention so that the number of people who have this disease would not increase. The best way to do this is by observing a healthy lifestyle even at a very young age. The parents should be the main focus of this method because they have to be informed of the proper diet and healthy lifestyle that they should teach their children. This would be very beneficial because if they would get used to this kind of practice they will eventually carry this out until their adult age.
Moreover, the school should also participate in enhancing the proper diet and healthy lifestyle of their students. Making sure that they served healthy foods in their cafeteria as well as including the idea of what healthy living is in their curriculum could make this possible. The recent acts of terrorism in the country also posed the query of how prepared America’s public health system is in terms of handling biological threats. According to the workshop conducted by the Institute of Medicine (2002), the country’s biodefense arsenal is sufficient enough to cure diseases caused by bioterrorist agent.
Nevertheless, the greater challenge is the rapid detection and the responsive delivery of medicines to individuals infected by it. There are still numerous substantial gaps within the public health system that should be addressed. The recent anthrax event is a clear proof that there are still improvements that should be made in order to prepare the public health system of handling biological threats. The Public health system of America has improved as the years go by. However, there are still improvements that need to be made in order to properly accomplished their objective of giving quality health to every individual in the country.
Greater participation coming from the federal government is needed to standardize the public health system among various states. New approaches and methodologies are also timely to better deal with the pressing health problems in the country. In the same manner, the over-all enhancement of the public health system would also aid in preparing the country to handle biological threats. All of these are essential in order to assure the safety and well being of every citizens in the state of America.