The Effects of Poverty on Health - Research Paper Example

?The Effects of Poverty on Health Poverty can be defined as the economic condition of a family that cannot provide the basic necessities of life likeadequate food, shelter and clothing. The effect of poverty on the general health of people is a debatable issue since the cultural context of poverty is also taken into consideration. There has been a significant increase of poverty rate in USA in the 2009 with the official rate being 14.3% which was 1.1% more than the poverty rate in 2008. It was also seen that the poverty rate for children was higher than that of the older people with children forming 35.5 percent of people in poverty. (Poverty in the United States, 2010, pp.298-299) If adequate economic support is not provided to these children then they will remain in the vicious circle of poverty perpetuating the increasing rate of the poor class. Economic conditions that result in poverty can also render a family homeless with no job and no money. If the duration of being homeless is longer then there is more possibility of a person to experience poor health and increased risk of premature death. In USA, infant mortality and unemployment are rampant in any major city. This is because of unequal distribution of wealth and unaffordable health care services. This situation will continue to worsen unless proper steps are taken to deal with the issue of poverty. (Camara, 2006, p.13) Poverty has become an issue for some that never felt they would be in that situation. Seniors have felt it strongly as well as retirement was not what they had planned for since their savings have been depleted. With the rising costs of healthcare, many programs that were once helping in the poverty stricken areas are not available now and the effects are beginning to show. This is an important part of our human services that needs to continue due to the recent outbreaks of whooping cough, and the reoccurrence of the chickenpox virus causing shingles. The definition of poor people in the USA In the current era of recession, poverty has become a major issue of concern in the USA. As the nation is striving to pull itself out of this long standing recession, there is a possibility of millions of people who will be forced to bear the brunt of poverty in the coming years. In the year 2006 which was the beginning of this Great Recession saw a rise of poverty by 27 percent resulting in 10 million people below the poverty line (McGreal, 2012). In America, there is no single variety of the poor. The poor population comprises of workers with low income, mothers who rear their children single handedly, disabled veterans, the old people, immigrants, those who have not received proper education and the fallen middle class. This population is found even in the wealthiest suburbs. Currently, in America there are 46.2 million people living below the poverty line which means this population has an annual income less than $22, 314 for a family of four. This situation is so worse that it is unlikely that the scenario will change even after the recession period ends and economy turns around. With the Great Recession there has been a high rate of the unemployment percentage which has resulted in many families being pushed below the poverty line. However, in America the definition of real poverty is a complex matter. It cannot be measured purely by the lack of material facilities that can be afforded by the families. It is highly possible that “poor families might well own a car or subscribe to cable TV”. Poverty of a family cannot be judged by a single year of income, and the more realistic approach is to measure the “family’s ability to make ends meet--to pay the electricity bill and put food on the table” (Kiviat, 2011, pp.34-41). Indicator of poverty is also more contextual than absolute. For instance, lack of indoor plumbing did not prove the family was poor 150 years ago, but today it indicates poverty. Poverty always does not mean having low income and not being able to afford material things. Poverty can also emerge from managing work and personal schedules, child-care arrangements and living conditions. Transportation which is also counted when measuring poverty depends on the distance between the home and the working place. All these factors can also have a negative effect on the children. (Kiviat, 2011, pp.34-41) For the purpose of bringing economic viability in the poor communities four key areas are needed to be addressed. Firstly, programs are needed to be designed in the manner that will meet the demands of the adults from poor family and also will meet the educational requirements of the poor children from pre-school to college. Secondly, the poor communities must have access to basic utilities like water, electricity and gas. The communities must also have access to transportation and modern technology. Thirdly, programs for the poor must be developed so that the poor people can get services regarding child care, mental and physical health. The poor working families and single parents must have the freedom to hold their jobs for a fulfilling productive life. Finally, health and social services must be promoted by collaborations with businesses and spiritual entities. (Landon, 2009, p.15) Concern for the older people Although in America there are numerous health care projects to serve the poor and the retired old people, the constant rise in health care costs is a matter of concern for the near-retirees. The older people who are close to retirement age usually tend to underestimate their expenses on health, and even then health care costs are their major causes of fear. According to John Carter, president of Nationwide Financial Distributors “Americans -- even those who have diligently saved for their golden years -- are not prepared for the reality of health care costs in retirement and don’t really understand how Medicare works” (Dugas, 2012) A poll conducted by Nationwide Financial has proved that almost half of the affluent population of the nation are afraid that the rising costs involved in health care will deplete their savings after retirement. The estimation that the pre-retiree people have on medical expenses is far below the actual figure. Their estimated cost of annual health care is about $5,621 while a study conducted by Nationwide Financial in 2011 says that the actual figure may be up to $10,750 which is almost double. The older people often suffer from the misconception that Medicare will cover their health issues in the long-term. They need to be properly educated with financial advice so that they can prepare themselves for the huge expenses that they will have to incur on health matters after retirement (Dugas, 2012). Influence of poverty on health “New studies suggest that the stress of being poor has a staggeringly harmful influence on health” (Sapolsky, 2005, p.92). Studies say that outbreaks of diseases like the typhoid outbreak in 1847 are much due to the poor and unhygienic living conditions of the poor people, as these conditions contribute towards the spread of the disease. It is often said that “physicians are advocates of the underprivileged” because more often poverty is the principle reason behind poor health. Poverty means the affected family because of their low income cannot afford sufficient food or can afford bad quality food. Their living conditions are unhealthy and this leads to several other unhygienic factors that lead to sickness. According to socioeconomic status, it is clear that the risk of having poor health increases with every step downward from the wealthiest sector of the society. There are many diseases that are considered as the affects of poor living conditions due to poverty like “respiratory and cardiovascular diseases, ulcers, rheumatoid disorders, psychiatric diseases and a number of cancers”. Comparative studies have proved that early mortality rate is more among the poor population. In America one study has shown that the people belonging to the poorest sector of the white population die about a decade earlier than the people belonging to the richest sector. This can be contributed to unhealthy lifestyles of the poor people in the Westernized society like America. These people grow the tendency to smoke and drink in uninhibited qualities. Their neighborhoods are more likely to be densely population and have less access to clean water and healthy food. These people also cannot afford to maintain in their homes “adequate heat during winter and air-conditioning in the summer”. All these factors result in increasing risk of poor health and high mortality rate (Sapolsky, 2005, pp.92-99) Studies have also shown that the health of children and their growth and development are adversely affected by prevalent poverty in America. Poverty and poor living conditions can be “associated with increased neonatal and postneonatal mortality rates, greater risk of injuries resulting from accidents or physical abuse/neglect, higher risk for asthma” (Aber et. al, 1997, p.463). In the last few decades it has been seen that there has been a chronic increase of severe poverty among families with children. Poverty among children are increasing at an alarming rate in the USA because of several factors like lower real income among the undereducated workers, programs concerned with transfer of income has decreased in real value and increasing rate of single mothers or families headed by female members. Workers who have received education for less than 12 years have lesser opportunities for jobs since the “technology and information economy expansion has excluded people with low educational background” (Wood, 2003, p.708). Also international competition has reduced the wages of manual laborers as low wages are paid to laborers in other countries. There are other factors that contribute towards family poverty and they are social, environmental and emotional issues. It has been seen that almost 33 percent of children who are struck by poverty have single mothers. The reason behind this is the dual loss of money earned by the fathers and their support for child care which results in poverty even when the mothers work. Single motherhood can also give rise to other problems like abuse and mental illness. In many families single mothers who are the heads of their families are abused or suffer from clinical depression (Wood, 2003, p.708). Poverty in a family results from the inability of the elderly members to meet the basic necessities of the children like food, clothing, shelter and health care. Since poverty leads to financial deficiencies resulting in conflict between parents, psychological problems and depression, these have a negative impact on the growth and development of the children. Studies have shown that a child can have proper mental and physical development in a healthy environment at home where their needs are fulfilled with long-term resources. A study conducted in 1988 showed that children coming from poor families with annual income below $10,000 suffer from emotional and behavioral problems and this rate is 25 percent higher than children coming from families with annual income above $40,000. (Oberg, 2003, pp.1-2) Children from poor families remain vulnerable to many factors arising from poverty. Many poor families struggle to survive in communities where the disadvantages of poverty are more prominent because of lack of financial investments and interference of political powers resulting in the families getting isolated from the mainstream society. These communities also do not provide the parents to form social networks which result in depression and child abuse. Also in these communities criminal activities are rampant which have a negative psychological effect on the children. The children from poor communities also do not develop socially as they are deprived from proper playing spaces and they do not get the opportunities to participate in school sports. All these factors “produce more severe, persistent poverty and deprivation that has a detrimental impact on the intellectual, emotional, and physical development of children” (Wood, 2003, p.708). Health care facilities There is one major reason that has been held responsible for the widespread poor health among the poor and it is accessibility of health care facilities. The poor people because of their low spending power can access only lower quality health care facilities. This reason can be considered as probable when it is considered that most of the poor people in America cannot afford to maintain the expenses of a family physician. For them medical care expenses amount to costs of admitting in emergency rooms in hospitals. (Sapolsky, 2005, pp.92-99) Health care services so far have been able to address the limited symptoms of poverty. It is now needed to reform the health care programs to make them more beneficial to the poor population. By proper leveraging of the existing resources it is possible to build “economically viable communities and healthier populations” (Landon, 2009, p.15). There can be three approaches for making public health care services beneficial to the poor people. The initiative can be taken by local volunteer groups to establish councils for health assessments in communities. The communities can have the option to determine which health issues are to be given top priority. For instance in Tennessee ten years ago county health councils (CHC) formed by local volunteer groups emphasized on dental care. The idea was to provide dental care facilities to school going children from low-income families. If children face tooth pain in school then they will be unable to concentrate on studies and as a result their grades in examinations will fall resulting in failing and drop-outs which means they will lose out on opportunities for jobs with high salaries. This is in turn will make them inaccessible to health insurance and it will lead to their children facing the same problems. The CHC members thus understood the chronic poverty problem and promoted dental health care through oral hygiene and reduced consumption of sugars. By solving the dental problems of the poor communities in Tennessee, it has now larger scope to concentrate on other serious ailments like heart disease and lung cancer. The second approach can be through education on a different level. It is required to educate the not-so-poor by putting them into the environment where the stench of poverty exists. The classrooms can exists within the communities where the common people can become teachers. These not-so-poor people will witness the experience of being poor on a daily basis and will thus understand the plight of poverty well enough to provide education to the poor on their physical and mental health issues. The purpose of such education can be to provide the students first-hand experience of what might or might not be applied to problems and challenges in the real world. The purpose of such education is also to impart the right kind of knowledge to the right kind of people within the communities. The third approach is individual opportunity by which people from the concerned communities are “employed as a means to reach those communities”. These people can reach those who are the real kinds of needy people to understand their real problems to learn new skills as solutions to the problems. (Erwin, 2008, p.1571) The recent epidemics of whooping cough and chicken pox virus in America have emphasized the need to focus more on the public health services and make them accessible and convenient for the poor population. Pertussis which is another term for whooping cough is the ongoing epidemic in Washington. The “early waning of immunity might be contributing to increasing population-level susceptibility”. So far vaccination is considered as the only remedial strategy to “reduce morbidity and mortality caused by pertussis” (Debolt, 2012, p.522). The American Academy of Pediatrics recommended in 1995 the need of varicella or chicken pox vaccination for children between 12 and 18 months of age. This vaccine has prevented “childhood deaths, lessened the risk of complications, reduced the number of missed school days, and decreased the danger for people who can’t be vaccinated” due to pregnancy or underage (Preventing Chicken Pox, 2004, p.65). It is the responsibility of the public health services to make vaccinations of both the epidemics available to the children from poor communities. Conclusion Public heath services should strive to ameliorate the health conditions of the poor communities by making their services accessible to them. It is also important that the concerned communities should come forward to take initiatives in this regard and create local health care innovations. To witness transformations within communities and health improvements in the poor communities, the government needs to introduce legislatures that will require executives to focus more on public health policies and budget appropriations so that the cost of the health services remain within the reach of the poor and the needy. References Aber, J.L. et. al. (1997) The Effects of Poverty on Child Health and Development. Annual Reviews, 18, 463-483 Although poverty in general is known as one of the major causes behind poor growth and development of children, however there is no unanimous agreement on its dynamic nature. This paper attempts to put forward some measures to be followed while measuring the effect of poverty on children. Camara, K. (May 4, 2006) The crisis of the urban poor. New York Amsterdam News, 97(19), 13 This paper talks about the government’s attitude towards poverty. The general belief that the poor people are lazy and waste resources needs to be replaced by a sincere effort from the government to eradicate continuity of poverty for generations. The author also says that the general people within a community should also make an effort on this. Debolt, C. et. al. (July 20, 2012) Pertussis epidemic: Washington, 2012. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 61(28), 517-522 This paper focuses on the recent outbreak of pertusis, the other name for whooping cough, in the state of Washington. This paper details the characteristics of the illness and along with it remedies are also mentioned. This paper provides statistical figures of the number of people affected based on their ages and the treatment they have received. Dugas, C. (May 7, 2012) Health care costs worry near-retirees, USA Today, retrieved on September 11, 2012 from: http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail?sid=503b0651-5775-40bd-a578-981126a3e88a%40sessionmgr110&vid=1&hid=106&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3d#db=aph&AN=J0E161201909412 This article talks about the concern of the old people who are nearing their retirement age regarding their medical expenses after their retirement. The persistent rising of health care costs adds to their agony combined with the fact that most of these people remain unaware of their actual potential medical costs. Erwin, P.C. (September, 2008) Poverty in America: How Public Health Practice Can Make a Difference. American Journal of Public Health, 98(9), 1570-1572 The author who has worked for the poor in Nepal and Pakistan shares his experience in this paper. He has mentioned about three kinds of approaches to address health and poverty. In this paper he elaborates on these approaches which are empowerment, education and opportunity with examples taken from Nepal and Pakistan. Kiviat, B. (November 28, 2011) Below the line. Time, 178(21), 34-41 This article throws light on five myths about poverty in America. Examples are used to disprove the myths like there are no poor people in the suburbs, poverty arises only out of low income, taking people out of their communities can help erase their poverty, poverty can be alleviated by focusing on individuals, and poverty cannot be entirely eradicated because of its complex nature. Landon, B. (October, 2009) Burden of Poverty in Rural America. Policy and Practice, 67(5), 14-16 The general approach towards health is to focus on the chronic diseases and their prevention. This article focuses on poverty as a major reason behind poor growth and development of health. The articles also provides ideas on how to how to make proper use of resources and ideas to maintain a balanced economy in society and healthier populations. McGreal, C. (January 11, 2012) Poverty in America likely to get worse, report finds, The Guardian, retrieved on September 11, 2012 from: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/jan/11/poverty-america-likely-worse-report Since the Great Recession in 2006, poverty has been rampant in America. This article talks about the concern regarding the status of the country’s economy and the fact that even after the country comes out of the recession, millions of people will still be pushed into poverty. This is because in the aftermath of the recession there will be cost cutting by the government on welfare budgets, and emergence of low paid jobs will increase poverty. Oberg, C. (May, 2003) The Impact of Childhood Poverty on Health and Development. Healthy Generations, 4(1), 1-11 This article focuses on the poverty among children and its persistent effect on their health. The author talks about the inter-relation between poverty and the situation in which a child grows and develops. He also talks about various projects which have been successful in aiding the concerned families to fight and overcome poverty. Poverty in the United States, (December, 2010). Congressional Digest, 89(10), 298-300 This article provides statistical figures of the number of poor people in America. The figures are based on their ages and the regions they live in. Figures are also given to provide information of the number of poor people among the natives and foreign-born, among the whites and blacks. It also mentions the economic situation and income deficit among the poor. Preventing Chicken Pox, (September, 2004). Scholastic Parent & Child, 12(1), 65 This articles talks about the virtues of varicella which is a vaccine given to all children to prevent chicken pox. The vaccine has been successful in lessening risks of complications and deaths among children. Sapolsky, R. (December, 2005) Sick of Poverty. Scientific American, 293(6), 92-99 This article examines the effects of poverty on health. According to research people from low socioeconomic backgrounds have higher risks of diseases and shorter life spans than people from rich economic backgrounds. This is because the stress of living in poor and violent neighborhoods with minimum social support can cause depression and diabetes. Wood, D. (September 3, 2003) Effect of Child and Family Poverty on Child Health in the United States. Pediatrics, 112(3), 707-711 Poverty has been defined as lack of basic needs of families and children like food, clothing and housing. However the relation between poverty and health and its effect on the growth and development of children is matter of debate. The culture of poverty is characterized by crime, violence, drugs and low education. This article focuses on the effects of poverty on the American children based on economic and ecological influences. Read More