There are a number of reasons why people’s lives are basically healthier today than they were 150 years ago.
And most of these factors fall in the domain of public health: cleaner water, air, and food; safe disposal of sewage; better nutrition; more knowledge concerning healthy and unhealthy behaviors; and many others.
Effective public health programs clearly save money on medical costs in addition to saving lives. Moreover, public health contributes a great deal more to the health of a population than medicine does.
According to one analysis, the life expectancy of Americans has increased from 45 to 75 years over the course of the 20th century.
Only five of those thirty additional years can be attributed to the work of the medical care system. The majority of the gain has come from improvements in public health, broadly defined as including better nutrition, housing, sanitation, and occupational safety.
The government has improved the structure of public health. Since the 19th century, the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life, and promoting physical health and efficiency has drastically improved, meaning that the general state of people’s health is now much better than it was.
To learn more, refer to the following sources below:
samples.jbpub.com - What Is Public Health? (Jones & Bartlett Learning, LLC)
Introduction to Public Health by Mary-Jane Schneider