Issues impacting health and development, Biology

Assignment Help:

Issues Impacting Health and Development

Poverty and malnutrition are the leading causes of high maternal and child mortality rates in developing countries. Together, they seriously impair the resistance of the body to infections. In children, malnutrition impacts their learning ability besides leading to high dropouts from schools. This reduces the returns to investment in education. The average real rate of social return on primary schooling in low income countries was estimated at 24 per cent (World Bank, 1981). If improved health status can be ensured through proper nutritional and health care, the rate of return on education can be improved. Better health implies that less resources are required to be devoted for curative health care. Resources thus spared can be spent for other productive purposes. Realising the severity of the problem, the millennium development goals (MDGs) of the UN included three goals to be targeted for achievement by 2015 in the health sector. These are

(i) reduction of under five child mortality by two-thirds;

(ii) improvement in maternal health by achieving reduction in maternal mortality rate by three-quarters;

(iii) combat diseases like malaria, HIV/AIDS and other diseases by reducing their incidence by one-half reversing the spread of such major diseases.
To achieve the above goals, massive funding and policy initiatives are required. Such initiatives, besides focusing on  improvement in consumption/nutritional levels, can be centred around the major diseases. Tuberculosis and Malaria are identified to be among the major diseases contributing to adult mortality. Acute respiratory infections is identified to be a major child killer. These diseases are known to hurt rural people more than city dwellers suggesting that the focus of policy initiatives should centre more on the rural population. Some simple measures/provisions identified to prevent the mortality arising from these diseases are: bed-nets, affordable antibiotics, trained birth attendants and spreading awareness on basic hygiene.
However, due to the large magnitude of the problem, the resources required to implement even such simple measures are huge. Along with the issue of  limited resources, two other issues confronting the task of effective health delivery are
inequity and  inefficiency. While the former refers to the problem of the rural health systems not having enough staff and resources dedicated to women and children, the latter refers to the anomaly on account of non-integration of vertical
programmes for specific diseases with the general health systems. All these concerns have received wide attention everywhere and specific suggestions have been made to tackle these problems.


Related Discussions:- Issues impacting health and development

Cell membrane lining the inner surface of the cell wall, Cell membrane lini...

Cell membrane lining the inner surface of the cell wall The cell membrane lining the inner surface of the cell wall is made up of phospholipids (45%) and proteins (55%). Some

Drawbacks of nutritional status that assessed traditionally, Define drawbac...

Define drawbacks of Nutritional status that assessed traditionally? Nutritional status assessed traditionally with the use of anthropometric, biochemical clinical and dietary a

Explain natural history of mitral stenosis, Q. Explain Natural History of M...

Q. Explain Natural History of Mitral Stenosis ? Untreated, mitral stenosis is a serious disease with observed 10-year mortality of 70-80 per cent in sy

Excretion., how are excretory products brought to the excretory organs to b...

how are excretory products brought to the excretory organs to be excreted?

Testing a leaf for statch, State four steps to be followed to test for star...

State four steps to be followed to test for starch in a leaf

GRADE 8 SCIENCE, what effects do human technologies have on our water syste...

what effects do human technologies have on our water systems?

Principle of echocardiography, Echocardiography Utilizes principle of ultra...

Echocardiography Utilizes principle of ultrasound for visualization of heart and great vessels. It uses sound in the frequency of 1-10 MHz. As the frequency of probe increase

Darwins theory of natural selection, Darwins theory of natural selection is...

Darwins theory of natural selection is considered a paradigm shift--a theory that has wide-ranging effects. Describe some of the advantages that this theory offered scientists once

Bone marrow transplant, BON E MARROW TRANSPLANT - It is transplante...

BON E MARROW TRANSPLANT - It is transplanted to treat leukemia. Here, graft itself causes immune rejection. Before transplant, the recipient's bone marrow cells, incl

Explain precautions for gram staining of bacterial cultures, Explain Precau...

Explain Precautions for Gram Staining of Bacterial Cultures? 1. The dilutions should be chosen on the basis of expected counts in the food sample. 2. Food should be kept in

Write Your Message!

Captcha
Free Assignment Quote

Assured A++ Grade

Get guaranteed satisfaction & time on delivery in every assignment order you paid with us! We ensure premium quality solution document along with free turntin report!

All rights reserved! Copyrights ©2019-2020 ExpertsMind IT Educational Pvt Ltd