Public health is the science of protection and upgrading families and communities' health by creating awareness for healthy lifestyles through education and policy making, prevention of injuries, doing research for diseases and detecting and controlling spread of infectious diseases. Generally public health is concerned with ensuring a safe and healthy environment for entire populations. It revolves around all disciplines in life and its professionals are tasked with the prevention of recurrence of problems and limit of health problems. Public health promotes healthcare equitability, ease of access and high quality standards.
Public health refers to the protection and improvement of a community, population or family health. Some of the activities involved are protection of food and water supplies, participation in voluntary health work and hospices and maintaining of birth and death records. Personal health refers to that individual decision making and actions that affect the health of an individual or an immediate family member or relative. Some of the activities involved are regular medical check-ups, eating balanced food and wearing safety belts.
Public health assessments are the processes through which information is obtained and interpreted so as to determine the health status of a specific population. These assessments mostly revolve around the following topics; environmental data, community concerns and health data. Benefits of these assessments are as follows. One is the regular monitoring of a communities' health status. Development of database that is recording population health registries helps professional keep track of the trends and progresses. Secondly, offers a chance to diagnose and investigate health problems or hazards. In cases of outbreak of diseases that necessities emergency responses, these assessments offer a chance to offer effectively solve those issues through offering a platform to conduct researches.
Moreover it creates sensitisation of the community on health related issues. This is possible through informing, education and empowering of people about health issues. It offers a chance to also evaluate instituted education policy and programs and their effectiveness occasionally. This also creates public openness and involvement on decisions that affect them. Generally there is a greater understanding of health issues in the community.
Public health features an emphasis on promotion of health of the population rather than individual health. This requires a lot of collection and use of sensitive data, surveillance of the community and other empirical assessments. In most cases ethical issues arise causing conflicts. Potential conflict that may arise is infringement of one's private life. Collection of data on a person may involve access to very confidential health conditions that requires being under lock and key.
Confidentiality and security of people's personal health records is crucial. Privacy is attributed to ones right of individual not to be coerced into giving on information of them. Epidemiologists should be ethically equipped people following that professional code of conduct. Appropriate measures and strict guidelines should be taken to protect privacy of individuals and keeping information confidential involving research participants during and after a study. The same also applies to personal information of staff in the public health activities. In case when there will be infringement on one's personal life parties involved should be informed of the reasons. And that decision should always be made following consultation with the administration superiors.
Public policy enormously impact public health. Public health assessments are used in most development projects. Before any project is developed extensive study has to be done. In most cases HIA involves the effects of a proposed project on environment, such as infrastructure and urban development.
Using these assessments it helps involved parties understand the health determinants on policy making as well as encouraging them to evaluate the health effects of a proposed projects on the population. Public health assessments provide a strong political and research tool that involves global policy issues, like the running of industries like oil, tobacco and fertilizers. They do play an important role in that it creates connections by having concrete evidences, between policies and environmental impacts that facilitate the making of good public policies and offer a platform for bad policies to be actively challenged.
Smoking is one of the most concerning health concerns.
When one is smoking it not only affects him but also the people in the nearby zone. Most states and territories have banned smoking in enclosed public places. In addition most outdoor areas have managed for smoking and different jurisdictions have different variability in terms of exception on smoking.
Queensland legislation stated that smoking in enclosed workplaces and public areas of liquor selling was restricted since 2002. Smoking was banned from any entrance with less than four metres of a non-residential house, ten metres of any children playground, artificial and patrolled beaches and in all stadia and rooms managed by Queensland Sports Facilities Authority. Liquor selling businesses could have designated smoking zones. However food selling businesses were not supposed to offer any smoking zones at all. This legislation is very important as it would warrant against unnecessary smoking. Toxicity of second-hand tobacco is very poisonous according to studies. Its exposure would lead to heart diseases, cardiovascular anomalies, and severe respiratory and ear infection as well as asthma attacks in children.