Understanding Health: Definition, Factors, and Social Impact
Health: Definition and Indicators
The World Health Organization (WHO), in 1946, defined health as a complete state of physical, mental, and social well-being, not merely the absence of disease. Since 1992, this definition has been expanded to include the concept of harmony with the environment.
The level of health is essential for the life and growth of a country and its social and economic progress. It is an important indicator of a nation’s welfare, level of development, and social stability. Therefore, health is a crucial part of social policies in daily political activity.
Because of its importance, health has always been at the center of public policy, which aims to protect and promote health, prevent disease, and ensure access to health services for the population. Health is determined by everything that surrounds us, making health policies intersectoral.
Concept of Health and Disease: Social Policy in the Health Field
There is no universally accepted definition of health. However, the Constitution of the World Health Organization (WHO) (April 7, 1948) defines it as a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being of the individual and the community. This definition moves beyond the idea of health as merely the absence of disease and biological functioning, including the social dimension.
The difficulty in defining health and disease stems from the imprecise boundaries between them. These boundaries vary according to cultural and social context, depending on criteria and value judgments that evolve over time, as well as cultural and professional contexts.
The importance of social context in defining health and illness is strongly influenced by social, moral, and religious values.
Factors Influencing Health
To analyze and group the factors that determine health and disease, whether individually or collectively, and their importance in implementing public health policies, we can group them into four categories:
Determinants Affecting Health
- Biological: Genes, Gender, and Age
- Socioeconomic: Poverty, Employment, Social Exclusion, Social Class, Public Services, Education, Entertainment, etc.
- Environment:
- Physical Environment: Air Quality, Housing, Water Quality, Food, Radiation, New and Old Infectious Agents
- Lifestyle: Diet, Physical Activity, Smoking, Alcohol, Sexual Habits, Drugs
- Health Services: Equity and Access to Preventive Services, Diagnostic Services, Treatment, Care
- Human Biology: This includes all the determinants given by nature (heredity, age, sex, etc.).
- Environment: This is the set of factors that come from outside and surround the individual. They are beyond personal decision and can be modified by collective action. They include two subgroups:
- Physical environment (air, water, food, etc.)
- Socio-economic environment surrounding the person (social class, education, poverty, etc.). Poverty is the leading cause of disease, so the fight against it has been and is the best way to improve the health of individuals and populations.
- Lifestyle: Habits that individuals adopt in their life (food, smoking, exercise, etc.) are credited with almost half of mortality in developed countries. However, due to socioeconomic conditions and personal decisions, individuals cannot be held fully responsible for their habits.
- Health Services: While having great importance for individual and collective health, they contribute less to health than the environment and lifestyles. Advances in health improvement are mainly due to improved living conditions (food, hygiene, sanitation, environment, etc.), much more so than the advances of modern medicine, although the latter should not be minimized.
Furthermore, due to its size, the health services sector has great social, political, economic, and scientific significance and is one of the most dynamic economic sectors.