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

What is vascular cambium? what are their functions?, What is vascular cambi...

What is vascular cambium? What are their functions? The Vascular cambium is the secondary meristematic tissue that in roots and in the stem forms the vascular tissues phloem an

Explain the adverse effects of rifamycin, Adverse effects of rifamycin  ...

Adverse effects of rifamycin  No severe adverse effects were observed in clinical trials with rifaximin. There have been a few postmarketingeports of hypersensitivity reactions

What is the expected phenotypic proportion, In tomatoes, two alleles of one...

In tomatoes, two alleles of one locus determine the character difference of purple versus green stems (alleles are P and p with P being completely dominatn and coding for purple st

Explain the methodology for seliwanoff test, Explain the Methodology for se...

Explain the Methodology for seliwanoff test? Take 5 ml of seliwanoff's reagent in a test tube. Add 5-6 drops of the glucose solution and heat the mixture to boiling for about 3

Growth and development of plants, Growth and Development of Plants You...

Growth and Development of Plants You must have seen beautiful plants growing in pots in a garden. The plant grows while the pot does not. As a rule living things grow, but non

What is isozymes, ISOZYMES : an enzyme having different molecular forms bu...

ISOZYMES : an enzyme having different molecular forms but catalyzing the same reaction.

Determine the urine analysis, Determine the Urine analysis Urine consti...

Determine the Urine analysis Urine constituent may be altered in urinary tract infection, systemic disease. However it is not routinely prescribed for most of the potential imp

Fungi, Which type of reproductive structure has a better chance of survival...

Which type of reproductive structure has a better chance of survival if there was a sudden temperature change in its environment?

Express an example of directional selection, The peppered moth experiment w...

The peppered moth experiment was an example of directional selection; due to environmental conditions the directional selection shifted from one extreme to the other in 1850s Engla

Explain subphylum urochordata, Subphylum Urochordata : (13,000 species, se...

Subphylum Urochordata : (13,000 species, sea squirts) Notocord is dorally situated, nerve tube dorsally situated and is hollow, chordate characteristics seen mainly in bilatera

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