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Prevention the difference between life and death

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Ben
3 yrs ago

The impact of COVID-19 provides powerful evidence for the government to boost Australia’s health prevention measures, according to the Consumers Health Forum (CHF).

“We can now see that preventive health will have saved many lives affected by COVID-19, while lack of preventive practices has doomed the lives of many thousands of others around the world,” CHF chief executive Leanne Wells said.

“The watershed impact of COVID-19 must surely press home the message of the need for a fresh era in health policy to adopt challenging policies now in areas like obesity for long term benefits,” Ms Wells said.

“We believe the balance sheet of lives lost and saved in the Australian experience with COVID-19 will bear out the need for a much more active and long-term preventive health architecture in the future.

“Just as the government has dedicated many billions of dollars to shore up the economy, there must be a reckoning that devoting more attention and resources to prevention health policy into the future will bear huge dividends in healthier lives and healthier budgets,” Ms Wells said.

Should more money be spent on preventative health in Australia?

3 comments
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Tanker
3 yrs ago

The old saying "prevention is better than cure" holds true today. It has a lower cost than attempting to cure as well as being physchologically better for the community as a whole. 

It will require a change in thinking as perhaps it may not be a profitable for current major players in the health industry but we need to cast off this constant drive for profit and more of it.

avatar
Tanker
3 yrs ago

The old saying "prevention is better than cure" holds true today. It has a lower cost than attempting to cure as well as being physchologically better for the community as a whole. 

It will require a change in thinking as perhaps it may not be a profitable for current major players in the health industry but we need to cast off this constant drive for profit and more of it.

avatar
Sophie
3 yrs ago

In 2008/9 a National Preventative Health Taskforce was set up to formulate a strategy to determine the best ways to deal with obesity, tobacco and excessive consumption of alcohol. It laid out a vision for how Australia could become the healthiest country by 2020. Well, it’s 2020 and are we? No, because the Abbott Government abolished the Australian National Preventive Health Agency and the National Partnership Agreement on Preventive Health.

It’s easy to say give more money to a project..however..without dedicated and qualified people from all walks of life, this will never get off the ground and money will be wasted. It is said it “takes a village to raise a child”, likewise, it takes an entire community to encourage healthy citizens. There should be shared responsibility at all levels of government, industry, business, the non-government sector, research institutions and communities.

Australia is not a poor country, yet in some areas poverty exists. If a family is living from hand to mouth, everything suffers, education, health and their wellbeing. We should take a leaf out of New Zealand’s book. They have a “Wellbeing Budget” which prioritises child poverty. We have to act early, provide the means for people to make healthy choices, not for a week or two, but until they can stand on their own two feet. I am not saying we should babysit people for the rest of their lives, but support them (especially the youth) in making healthy lifestyle choices. 

There is no question prevention works…the task is to get this idea through to people and improve access to services.

 

3 comments



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