Health (redirected from Health Policy)

health

Extent of continuing physical, emotional, mental, and social ability to cope with one's environment. Good health is harder to define than bad health (which can be equated with presence of disease) because it must convey a more positive concept than mere absence of disease, and there is a variable area between health and disease. A person may be in good physical condition but have a cold or be mentally ill. Someone may appear healthy but have a serious condition (e.g., cancer) that is detectable only by physical examination or diagnostic tests or not even by these.

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health

1. the state of being bodily and mentally vigorous and free from disease

2. the general condition of body and mind

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health [helth]

(medicine)

A state of dynamic equilibrium between an organism and its environment in which all functions of mind and body are normal.

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Health

agate

symbolizes health; supposed to relieve snake and scorpion bites. [Class. and Medieval Legend: Leach, 27]

Asclepius’ cup

symbolizes well-being. [Gk. Myth.: Jobes, 397]

Carna

goddess of physical fitness. [Rom. Myth.: Leach, 192]

Damia

goddess of health. [Gk. Myth.: Jobes, 409]

Hygeia

goddess of health; daughter and personification of Asclepius. [Gk. Myth.: Kravitz, 123]

Hygeia’s cup

symbol of fertility and fitness. [Gk. Myth.: Jobes, 396–397]

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Health 

the natural state of the body, characterized by its equilibrium with the environment and by the absence of any pathological changes.

Human health is determined by a complex of biological (inherited and acquired) and social factors; the latter have such great significance in the maintenance of a state of health and in the origin and development of disease, that the preamble to the code of the World Health Organization reads: “Health is a state of complete physical, spiritual, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of diseases and physical defects.” However, such a broad sociological definition of health is somewhat debatable, since the full social development of man does not always coincide with his biological state. In general, the concept of health is somewhat conditional and is objectively established according to the totality of anthropometric, clinical, physiological, and biochemical indexes, which are determined while sex and age factors as well as climatic and geographic conditions are taken into account.

Health must be characterized not only qualitatively but also quantitatively, because there is the concept of the degree of health, which is determined by the breadth of the adaptive possibilities of the body. Although health is essentially a state contrary to that of disease, it is connected with disease by various transitional states, and there may not be distinct boundaries between the two states. A state of health does not exclude the presence in the body of a not-yet-manifested pathogenic principle or of subjective fluctuations in a person’s feeling of well-being. In connection with these features, there has arisen the concept of the “practically healthy person,” in whom pathological changes observed in the body do not affect the subjective state of being and are not reflected in the person’s efficiency. At the same time, the absence of manifest disturbances of health does not indicate the absence of a pathological state, since overstrain of the protective-adaptive mechanisms, while not disrupting health, may lead to the development of disease under the action of strong stimuli on the body.

Factors that determine the health of a population are the amount of real wages, the length of the working day, the degree of intensity and conditions of work, the presence of occupational hazards, nutrition, the housing conditions, the life-style, the state of public health, and the sanitary condition of the country. There is practically no well-defined criterion for judging the state of health of the inhabitants of any country; even such a complex index as the average longevity, taken alone without consideration of complex social and biological research, is still insufficient for evaluation of the health of a population. The scientific organization of health protection for individual persons and groups of people must be based on increasing the defensive properties of the body and on creating conditions that prevent the possibility of human contact with various pathogenic stimuli or reduce their effect on the body.

Soviet public health services strive in every possible way to develop, preserve, and strengthen human health. This is possible because of the prophylactic character of Soviet medicine; free, available, and qualified treatment; the creation of a broad network of institutions for treatment and prophylaxis, sanatoriums, and rest homes; and massive organization of physical culture and sports. The Basic Principles of Legislation of the USSR and the Union Republics on Public Health, adopted by the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on Dec. 19, 1969, reads: “The protection of the people’s health is one of the most important tasks of the Soviet government… . Protection of the health of the population is the obligation of all government organs and community organizations.”

V. A. FROLOV