Impact of Income and Social Status on Health - Essay Example

? Impact of Income and Social Status on Health Impact of Income and Social Status on Health Introduction An assessment of the broad subject of health reveals multiple determinants. Some of these determinants include issues of physical location, education levels, social support networks and matters of income or socio-economic status (Skolnik, 2008). These factors work singly or in combination to determine the nature of health both at individual levels and in groups. Depending on the variables of place, time, personality and circumstances, these determinants could play a positive role or a negative one. Exploring the various aspects of health requires a deeper insight into the relationship between health and income across the categories of culture, gender, type of lifestyle, and other variables that affect the status of health (Skolnik, 2008). Studies have shown that there are no clear lines in the operation of these variables because they cut across certain universal truths. For instance, lifestyle diseases have demonstrated prevalence across the income and age divides in recent times (Skolnik, 2008; Mirowsky & Ross, 2003). Therefore, the effect of income and social status on health should be determined from an aggregate of factors that work in the modern society. Income and Social Status Health is significantly reliant on the variables of income and social status. Naturally, high-income status and socio-economic status play a positive role on matters of health. Individuals and groups placed at higher income levels and socioeconomic status have a wider choice when it comes to matters of health (Mirowsky & Ross, 2003). On the other hand, individuals with low-income levels and socioeconomic status could be more vulnerable to some of the common challenges that attend to the subject of health. Similarly, richer countries that manifest high levels of per-capita income are more likely to engage health challenges than poor countries. However, a range of studies has reinforced the fact that populations in both rich and poor countries are not homogenous (Riegelman, 2009). Categories within these populations will manifest different levels of capacities to engage with health challenges. As a result, it becomes necessary to determine the kind of issues that affect various sections of populations basing purely on the variable of income and social status. The United States is one of the countries that has appreciated the challenges brought about by inequalities in income and social status in relation to matters of healthcare. The United States has developed legal structures to ensure some form of parity in healthcare provision across the income divide (Levine, 2009). The American Healthcare Bill otherwise known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act was aimed towards addressing the income and social status components of health care. The merits of this bill are anchored in its vigorous advocacy of affordable healthcare for all American citizens. Deliberate restructuring in the sector have been made so that the burden of the cost of medication might shift more on collective taxation, the state and insurance firms rather than on individuals (Levine, 2009). The Health Care Bill proposes a number of safeguards that are meant to shield the citizenry from the unsteady costs of medical care. The bill sought to restore stability and predictability in the expenditure on medical care. The primary concern was that a revised form of insurance systems would distribute the costs of medical care equally across various statuses, and other social stratifications. Towards this objective, the bill provided that people who earned more should be made to incur more in medical care than those who earned less. Another important safeguard of this bill was that it would no longer be possible for insurance firms to abandon their clients who became ill. This particular measure was aimed to arrest a sweeping trend where insurance firms deregister clients who are taken ill. For medical professionals this bill means that they would be forced to give fair treatment across the board without discrimination. The past trend was that the medical personnel and institutions would be willing to give preferential treatment to the privileged in the society while neglecting the disadvantaged suffering majority. The main proponents of this bill were Democrats who believe in the will of the majority. Their concern was that a government of good conscience should reach out to its suffering masses with assistance from the larger pull of collective wealth. The Republicans, on the other hand contested the merits of this bill, arguing that it had some totalitarian aspect in the sense that it involved the thrashing of individual freedoms at the expense of the society’s commonwealth. Lifestyle diseases are largely a manifestation of the variations in social trends that come along with changes in diet, environment, occupation, and levels of activity. An understanding of these diseases could be analyzed from historical and geographical perspectives that show the movement of these variations in time and space. The occurrence of diseases in the past was mostly a product of external forces and pressures. The victim was usually not involved in their nature and occurrences. Medics, scientists and other professional personalities have sought varying interpretations of the scope and magnitude of these diseases. All of them have published resourceful blueprints that explore the threat of lifestyle diseases on the human family but few of them have managed to come up with an absolute link between the source of the lifestyle diseases and the ultimate remedy. The vacuum of information that has been created by this absence of a conclusive analysis has become the fertile ground on which the contradictions, misinformation, and outright fallacies have thrived. The physical afflictions that tormented populations in the past epochs were, in many cases, communicable. The red plague that occurred during the Elizabethan periods, and small pox are examples of diseases that had external causes. The victims were vulnerable in the sense that they could not put in place any sufficient safeguards to protect themselves against the occurrence of these diseases. This mainly applied during the agrarian periods. One main distinguishing feature of these diseases is that they occurred spontaneously and many of them of had a causative agent. This aspect is what sets these diseases apart from the modern lifestyle diseases. The occurrence of modern health challenges have displayed variations across many aspects that include geographical location, level and kind of civilization, environmental factors, divisions of race, religion, age, gender and other aspects that distinguish the identities of populations. For instance across the divisions of career there has been a tendency of people engaged in white color jobs to express a higher rate of affliction than those who engage in blue color occupations. As it has been argued earlier, there is a significant difference in the level of activity between these two kinds of occupations. The level of activity is directly proportional to the degree of health of any individuals, according to scientists. Less physically active people will tend to attract more lifestyle complications than more physically active individuals do. Blue-collar employee will expend much of his calorie intake in the physical tasks that relate to his occupation. On the other hand, the white color individual will tend to stock up in his body reserves of useless calories that accumulate at some point in his life to create physical ailments. The most obvious one is obesity, but in time, it develops into other complications that relate to diabetes, heart diseases, or even stroke. The foodstuff that is consumed by the white-collar employees, according to various research findings is mostly sugary and junk. The blue color people will tend, on the other hand, to seek out foodstuffs that blend well into their nutritional occupations. This marked difference in diet preference has reflected empirically on the trends of the occurrence of diseases such as obesity and heart diseases across these two categories of employees. Although affluent individuals have the power to switch to the best foods in terms of nutrition and calories, they will tend to ignore expectations and engage in types of lifestyles that put them at the peril of acquiring many of these diseases. Besides, their financial resources also expose them to luxurious lifestyles that include binge drinking, heavy smoking, and drug use. The predicament among this category is that the wealth they have can convert into a potent destructive element that accelerates their entry into the most destructive forms of lifestyles. Studies have revealed that the deaths that relate to binge drinking and various forms of substance abuse have been common in affluent environments than elsewhere. Related to the above categorization of affluence individuals is the factor of geographical affluence. This category can be understood better is analyzed in terms of developing and developed countries. Developed countries, for the sake of this argument, will be assumed to be the affluent countries. The developing countries might, therefore, be regarded as the less affluent countries. Theoretical Perspective Social Suffering Theory Theoretically, an understanding of the income and social status as a determinant of health could be placed within the theory of social suffering. According to the theory of social suffering, socioeconomic factors can create or reduce the prevalence of diseases (Mirowsky & Ross, 2003). This theory argues that structural differences that manifest within classes result in conditions that unsettle the health equation of population. The theory provides the examples of tuberculosis and the emergence of resistant diseases as examples of consequences of socio-economic factors. Social institutions can worsen the condition of suffering if they are not properly regulated (Mirowsky & Ross, 2003). For instance, this theory examines the manner in which bureaucracies that are created within social institutions disrupt the normal cause of life. Further, this theory contends that the kind of suffering that result from diseases can extend beyond the patient to other people and social networks. The patient is therefore considered as an extension of the society. This would imply that the occurrence of a disease at an individual or group level will tend to multiply the scope of damage through the various connections of individuals. In this regard, it becomes appropriate to determine approaches that might be used to solve the occurrence and challenge of the disease at a broader level. In some sense, this theory attacks some of the conventional approaches that are often relied upon to promote health in the modern world. An appreciation of the connections that exist between individuals and places makes it necessary for the world to create standard approaches that seek to address health concerns in a uniform and globalized context. Such an approach would necessarily aim to solve the challenge by attending to the structural causes of the problem. This theory should be appreciated in light of the socioeconomic disparities that are often blamed for the rise of diseases such as Aids and Malaria. These diseases have affected the world largely due to the challenges of low income and poverty among the vulnerable groups. Poor nations often face health-related challenges because they cannot generate sufficient resources to fund for projects and developments, which would be necessary for solving health problems. On the other hand, richer nations will tend to have fewer social challenges, and this would translate into less health challenges (Mirowsky & Ross, 2003). The theory of social suffering attempts to uncover the structural and institutional defects that promote bad policies and actions, and which expose groups, communities, nations, and individuals to the perils of disease. For example, lack of proper social institutions such as health insurance schemes could result heightens the vulnerability of individuals and groups to diseases. At the same time, poorly structured health policies could create conditions that are detrimental to the status of health of individuals and communities. The merit of this theory could be assessed from the dimension of causes and effects of diseases in the society. In some sense, the theory reads like a critique of policy and method with specific regard to health. Inequalities result from manmade actions and imbalances. Addressing these imbalances provides opportunities of solving health concerns at multiple levels of the society. In the modern world, institutions and individuals have expanded their networks of interactions largely due to the synergies provided by developments and innovations in information technology. Movements across vast geographical spaces have also expanded the concepts, approaches, and methods of healthcare. The theory of social suffering provides resourceful insights of exploring the best possible approaches of handling emergent challenges. Conclusion Income and social status determines the nature of lifestyle for communities, groups and individuals. In turn, lifestyle affects the nature of health of the same people either positively or negatively. Conventionally, people with higher incomes and higher levels of social status enjoy certain advantages when it comes to the choice of health services as compared with individuals and groups at lower levels of the income hierarchy. However, some in the higher income category could and have used their wealth to engage in hazardous lifestyles that affect their status of health. Along the differences of class, the affluent families in the west will usually manifest a higher degree of lifestyle diseases than the lower class. This happens chiefly because the richer individuals are more sedentary in their lifestyles than the relatively less rich individuals are. The affluent individuals have the financial resources that expose them to the kinds of lifestyle that is associated with lifestyle complications. However, the impact of higher income and higher social status is largely positive than negative. References Levine, R, A. (2009). Shock therapy for the American health care system: why comprehensive reform is needed. ABC-CLIO. Mirowsky, J. & Ross, C., E. (2003). Education, Social Status, and Health. New York: Transaction Publishers. Riegelman, R., K. (2009). Public Health 101: Healthy People - Healthy Populations. New York: Jones & Bartlett Learning. Skolnik, R. (2008). Essentials of Global Health. New York: Jones & Bartlett Learning. Read More