Film: In Sickness and in Wealth

 

“In Louisville, Kentucky a data Maps gives a clearer picture of what conditions correlate to illness and death across the city. Death rates from lung cancer has better outcome in the East. The lighter shades mean lower rates of death and illness and the darker shades and being higher rates. The highest rates of death from diseases of the heart are in the West End. The data is an indicator of population health excess death. The notion of excess death says that you should be able to predict in any one-time frame how many people in a population will die and the number that die is higher than that. That differential is excess death. Premature death should not have happened it is not as if we will not die. We all will die but the question is at what age, with what degree of suffering, with what degree of preventable illness. These are death rates from all types of cancer, and you see the same pattern in some areas. People die three to five or even ten years sooner than in others. Cancer and heart disease are almost twice the rate in some areas as in others”.

 

The film shows many faces of Louisville population spread over 26 neighborhoods or council districts. It shows social and economic environment of each district with a distinct health profile. The movie reveals that further East are more affluent communities. Furthest East and North is council district 16, is the most affluent community.

 

 The film reveals Whitehall’s study, “The lower the grade of employment the higher the risk of heart disease but not just heart disease every major cause of death so if you were second from the top you had worse health than you if you were at the top if you were third from the top you had worse health than if you were second from the top all the way from top to bottom.”

 

 The movie suggests a correlation between the health of populations in Louisville and the social conditions that can be seen as you go from one council district to another.

 

The film alluded that American children who live in poverty can have lifelong health consequences. “Just the burden of day after day not knowing whether there's going to be food on the table or not knowing whether you're going to have a roof over your head is actually toxic to the brain and the reason for that is because when the stress hormone levels go up and if it stays up for days and weeks on end those hormone levels literally interfere with the development of brain circuitry they interfere with the development of connections in the brain so we begin to see in children who experienced toxic stress long term impacts of what's basically been chemically damaging to their brands the concept here is the pileup of risk the cumulative burden of having things that are increasing your chances of having problems as opposed to the cumulative protection of having things in your life that increase the likelihood that you're going to have better outcomes economic security.”

The notion that poor people are in worse physical condition and have an increased risk for death compared with those who are better off is worrisome. United States is a wealthy nation and to have a population that could not afford to live a healthy life is heart-breaking! This disparities in mortality rates between the rich and the poor in illness like heart disease, cancer, and diabetes have widened. https://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/09/27/health-wealth-gaps-in-new-york-neighborhoods-are-sobering-report-shows/?searchResultPosition=1

What can we do as a nation to address the disparities in health?

I personally in favor of government guaranteed health insurance. While a single-payer system is not the only way for the government to guarantee coverage for all, I think one way to think of such a system is to consider it “Medicare for all.”

But such a system would have to be accompanied by a hard look, led by medical experts and members of the community, at what works and what doesn’t, an assessment of how we can best budget our health care dollars to achieve the best possible health care outcomes. Such a system would take time and there would be hard choices, and not everyone would be happy. But we might come closer than we are to representing the interests of most Americans.

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I Am Not Your Negro By James Baldwin

Image
  The author James Baldwin's documentary film "I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO," aims to reckon with the lives and deaths of Martin, Medgar, and Malcolm. He wanted to share the dreadful journeys of these leaders to expose the racism that is ravaging the country, the United States of America. As a speaker in one of the debates, Mr. Baldwin reiterates what Mr. Robert Kennedy mentioned, "It was conceivable that in 40 years in America we might have a Nigger president." Mr. Baldwin answers , "That sounded like a very emancipated statement, I suppose. To white people, we are not in Harlem when this statement was first heard. Not here and possibly will never hear the laughter and the bitterness in the school which is taken was greeted on the point of view of Harlem barbershop. Bobby Kennedy only got here yesterday, and he is already on his way to the presidency. We have been here before 100 years, and now he tells us that maybe in 40 years if you are good, you might become
Read more

Introduction

  My name is Gemma. I hold a Rhode Island Early Childhood teacher certification and a master's in early childhood education from Rhode Island College. I am currently studying the Rhode Island College's TESL (Teaching English as a Second Language) program. M.Ed. in TESOL would enhance my skills and knowledge to best support the emergent bilingual learners. My position at the Henry Barnard School for sixteen years allowed me to deliver lessons such as creative curriculum and Reggio Emelia inspired-approach curriculum. I am a Reggio Emelia-inspired early childhood educator. I provide young students with exciting materials that encourage explorations and curiosity in the different learning centers. In the classroom and the playground, I listened to and observed the children's topics of interest. Then I create a lesson plan that reflects on what they understand and builds on that knowledge by further investigation, reading related literature, inviting expert speakers, and go
Read more

Precious Knowledge

Image
A film Directed by Ari Luis Palos                                                                           The film presents a series of Raza studies controversy that led to the bill’s introduction that would ban these ethnic studies programs. Raza studies were gaining popularity in 1997 in Tucson, Arizona. The Tucson Unified School District data reported a forty-eight percent dropout rate in graduation among the Latino student population.   In response, the district created a study group that identified different variables that caused the diminishing graduation rate among Latinos. Eventually, a social justice pedagogy gained traction. Raza’s studies made it through the school district governing board recommendation. The goal is to lower the Latino dropout rate. In 2002, the Tucson Unified School District conveyed a substantial ninety-three percent progress on graduation rate among Latino students. The film illustrates the classes taught in the Raza studies program. In addition,
Read more