Factors of an unhealthy community

Poorly Sanitized Areas

1. POLLUTION: the presence in or introduction into the environment of a substance or
thing that has harmful or poisonous effects.
2. Improper waste disposal: human activities are the main cause of the calamity in our
country. Ignorance of people brought large amount of garbage to our place. And since
effects of improper waste management is the main topic, it gave emphasize to those
effects according to the resource articles. The waste products are mainly of three types:
solid, liquid or in gas state. Solid waste is known as non-biodegradable waste
Materials and discards that come from sources like:

 Households
 Businesses and Commercial establishments
 Manufacturers or Industrial sites
 Biomedical sources like hospital and clinics.

For Example: plastics, Styrofoam containers, bottles, cans, papers, scrap iron, and other trash
Solid wastes are generally composed or made of non-biodegradable and non-compostable
Biodegradable materials.

These waste are also capable of leaching organic or chemical compositions to contaminate the
ground where such waste lay in accumulation. Solid wastes thrown in streets, highways, and
waterways can cause pollution when they are carried off by rainwater run-offs or by flood water
to the main streams or drainage, as they contaminating residues will reach larger bodies of water.

According to MMDA Chairman Francis Tolentino, they have collected over 1,000 tons of
garbage in just 4 days. They have dredged 1,200 tons of garbage from the eight creeks that scope
of their flood control management. The highest volume of garbage according to them came from
Pinagsabugan and Longos creeks in Malabon. It’s about 76 over 173 truckloads of waste.
Imagine the volume of garbage in just only eight creeks. How about the total of volume of waste
in the Philippines? In just statistics, we can see what calamity it can cause when these garbages
are not being collected.

Low Health Care Qualities

 1. High mortality rate: there is an increased number of deaths during a particular period of
time among a particular type or group of people.

Types of mortality rates

There are several different mortality rates used to monitor the level of mortality in populations.
In humanitarian emergencies, the following are most commonly used:

A. Crude mortality rate

 Counts all deaths

o All causes
o All ages and both sexes
 Denominator includes entire population
o All ages and both sexes

B. Age-specific mortality rate

 Counts only deaths in specific age group

o Usually calculated for children less than 5 years of age
 Denominator includes only persons in that age group

There are also mortality rates which are not really rates. They use live births as the denominator
instead of the actual group in which deaths are counted:

C. Infant mortality rate-Counts deaths in children less than 12 months of age, divides by
number of live births in same time period

D. Maternal mortality rate- Counts deaths in women due to pregnancy or child birth,
divides by number of live births in same time period

E. Under-5 mortality rate- Counts deaths in the first 5 years of life, divides by number of
live births in the hypothetical cohort of newborns.

2. Epidemic Outbreak: An epidemic occurs when an infectious disease spreads rapidly to many
people. For example, in 2003, the severe acute respiratory syndrome(SARS) epidemic took
the lives of nearly 800 people worldwide. Although communicable diseases have declined
in industrialized societies, outbreaks of disease such as influenza, gastroenteritis, and
hepatitis are still important. If a disease is endemic (habitually present in a community) it
is necessary to estimate its previous frequency and thereby confirm an increase in
 incidence above the normal endemic level. Pseudo epidemics may arise from sudden
increases in doctors' or patients' awareness of a disease, or from changes in the
organization of a doctor's practice. When the endemic level has been defined from
incidences over previous weeks, months, or years the rate of increase of incidence above
this level may indicate whether the epidemic is contagious or has arisen from a point
source. Contagious epidemics emerge gradually whereas point source epidemics, such as
occur when many people are exposed more or less simultaneously to a source of
pathogenic organisms, arise abruptly.

3. Few Health Care Officials:

One of the functions of public health officials is to communicate public health

information provided by surveillance and health information systems to policymakers,
health care providers, and the administrative agencies involved in the control of public
health problems. So basically, having a lack of public health officials may lead to
healthcare problems and guides.

4. Poor lifestyle

In recent decades, life style as an important factor of health is more interested by

researchers. According to WHO, 60% of related factors to individual health and quality
of life are correlated to lifestyle (1). Millions of people follow an unhealthy lifestyle.
Hence, they encounter illness, disability and even death. Problems like metabolic
diseases, joint and skeletal problems, cardio-vascular diseases, hypertension, overweight,
violence and so on, can be caused by an unhealthy lifestyle. The relationship of lifestyle
and health should be highly considered.

 Diet and Body Mass Index (BMI): Diet is the greatest factor in lifestyle and has a direct and
positive relation with health. Poor diet and its consequences like obesity is the common healthy
problem in urban societies. Unhealthy lifestyle can be measured by BMI. Urban lifestyle leads to
the nutrition problems like using fast foods and poor foods, increasing problems like
cardiovascular
 Exercise: For treating general health problems, the exercise is included in life style. The
continuous exercise along with a healthy diet increases the health. Some studies stress on the
relation of active life style with happiness
 Sleep: One of the bases of healthy life is the sleep. Sleep cannot be apart from life. Sleep
disorders have several social, psychological, economical and healthy consequences. Lifestyle
may affect on sleep and sleep has a clear influence on mental and physical health.
 Sexual behavior: Normal sex relation is necessary in healthy life. Dysfunction of sex relation is
the problem of most of societies and it has a significant effect on mental and physical health. It
 can be said that dysfunctional sex relation may result in various family problems or sex related
illnesses like; AIDS
 Substance abuse: Addiction is considered as an unhealthy life style. Smoking and using other
substance may result in various problems; cardiovascular disease, asthma, cancer, brain injury.
According to the resent studies in Iran, 43% of females and 64% of males experience the use of
hubble-bubble. A longitudinal study shows that 30% of people between 18–65 years old smoke
cigarette permanently.
 Medication abuse: It is a common form of using medication in Iran and it is considered as an
unhealthy life style. Unhealthy behaviors in using medication are as followed: self-treatment,
sharing medication, using medications without prescription, prescribing too many drugs,
prescribing the large number of each drug, unnecessary drugs, bad handwriting in prescription,
disregard to the contradictory drugs, disregard to harmful effects of drugs, not explaining the
effects of drugs.
 Application of modern technologies: Advanced technology facilitates the life of human beings.
Misuse of technology may result in unpleasant consequences. For example, using of computer
and other devices up to midnight, may affect on the pattern of sleep and it may disturb sleep.
Addiction to use mobile phone is related to depression symptoms.
 Recreation: Leisure pass time is a sub factor of life style. Neglecting leisure can bring negative
consequences. With disorganized planning and unhealthy leisure, people endanger their health.

5. Chronic Illnesses

Unhealthy lifestyle, poor nutrition, and environment increase the risk of cancer,
developmental disabilities, respiratory and cardiovascular diseases, obesity, diabetes, and
many other chronic illnesses.

COMPONENTS OF A HEALTHY COMMUNITY

• A clean, safe, high-quality environment (including housing)

• An ecosystem that is stable now and sustainable in the long term

• A strong, mutually supportive and non-exploitative community

• A high degree of public participation in and control over the decisions affecting life, health and
wellbeing

• The meeting of basic needs (food, water, shelter, income, safety, work) for all people

• Access to a wide variety of experiences and resources, with the possibility of multiple contacts,
interactions and communication

• A diverse, vital and innovative economy

• Encouragement of connections with the past, with the varied cultural and biological heritage and with
other groups and individuals
• A city form (design) that is compatible with and enhances the preceding parameters and forms of
behavior

• An optimum level of appropriate public health and sick care services accessible to all

• High health status (both high positive health status and low disease status) (Hancock & Duhl, 1988)