Introduction
Every citizen is entitled to the right to have good health. However, sometimes it is difficult for every individual to access the best health care. There is a wide range of inequalities, such as the life expectancy of people living with disabilities is lower than those leading a healthy life. Either, people who are socially stable are likely to get medical care more frequently than those who are unstable. These factors may lead to divisions in the society and if they are not looked upon in time, they may lead to adverse health effects. The government should focus on coming up with policies to mitigate the inequalities. The public also should be informed and make informed decisions to reduce these cases for the better lives of each citizen. Public resources need allocations, and areas with poorly developed health facilities should be prioritized. It will ensure that the country reduces the number of cases.
Premature Death
Statistical data collected by the world health organization shows that high blood pressure, defined in two conditions, systolic blood pressure and diastolic blood pressure, were the major cause of hypertension. Hypertension has a wide contribution to premature deaths of people between the age of 50-70. WHO also discovered that accidents contributed to the deaths but lifestyle diseases were the major contributors to the incidents of death. These risks are modifiable and if good policies are laid down, they can prevent or reduce further deaths. Minimizing possibilities associated with premature deaths requires the government to prioritize its budget when developing policies to curb this health inequality. With such an understanding and with it the demand, it becomes the mandate of the government to lay policies whose responsibility is to curb premature deaths.
Causes of Premature death
Premature death takes place before the average death age within a population. In the U.S., premature deaths are deaths below 75 years and mostly affect rural counties, with a majority being indigenous populations and blacks. Fundamental causes of health inequality include unequal distribution of income, wealth and power. It may lead to poverty and marginalization of some groups in society. Environmental influences, on the other hand, shape the individual experiences across the population and leads to health inequality. Individual experiences also contribute to health inequality. This may include economic and physical learning services and social and interpersonal influences. These factors should be studied seriously to come up with respective solutions in nature. Every citizen is entitled to better medical services and therefore, the government should ensure its citizens receive quality care.
Why Premature Deaths Matter
Premature deaths are a measure of years of potential life lost years due to death occurring before the age of 75. For example, a person dying at age 70 would lose five years of potential life, whereas a child dying at age five would lose 70 years of potential life. Compared to deaths closer to age 75 years, younger ages contribute more to premature death. Since 2000, the rise in suicide and drug deaths has contributed to the increase in premature death. A majority of premature deaths are preventable through modifying lifestyle habits such as taking part in exercises, quitting smoking, and eating healthy foods. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), it is estimated that between 20 percent and 40 percent of premature deaths can be prevented (Shiels et al., 2020).
Who Is Affected?
Populations at higher risk for premature death include American Indian/Alaska Native populations: Native American/Alaska Native people have persistently higher premature mortality rates compared to non-Hispanic whites. Infant mortality rates are almost two times higher among American Indians and Alaska Natives compared with non-Hispanic whites and are a major contributor to premature deaths (Mark et al., 2017). Black populations: Black individuals have had a persistently two-fold greater premature mortality rate compared to white individuals from 1960 through 2009 (Mark et al., 2017). Compared to urban counties, people who live in rural counties. Non-Hispanic Black adults in rural counties have the highest mortality rate; however, non-Hispanic white adults in rural areas had the largest increase in mortality rates (Mark et al., 2017). While social factors are not the direct causes of death, they can play a role in how and why a person dies.
What Works
The conditions contributing to premature death vary between communities and local solutions need to account for intercommunity health needs and disparities. A change in lifestyle minimizes premature deaths by decreasing risk factors. Lifestyle changes in alcohol consumption, diet, exercise, medication use for the treatment of conditions such as depression, diabetes, or hypertension, and tobacco use help minimize premature deaths (Curry et al., 2018). Some of the strategies by the CDC include a traditional foods intervention to reduce rates of diabetes for American Indian and Alaska Natives, an asthma complications intervention for Black and Hispanic children at risk, an intervention for Hispanic and Latino men to prevent contracting HIV, among others (Curry et al., 2018). Intervention strategies encouraging individuals to achieve healthy lifestyles and seek preventive medical care can be effective in minimizing premature deaths. Likewise, access to primary care and primary care mental health providers can help reduce premature deaths (Shiels et al., 2020).
Drug and Substance Policy to Curb Premature Deaths among the Youths
The ineffectiveness of the existing policies on drugs shows the government has not done a lot to ensure that drug and substance abuse is reduced in society. The inability of the policies to create awareness of the adverse effects of drugs makes the youths leaders in the abuse of drugs because of idleness (Peacock et al., 2018). Vulnerability by the youths to drug abuse has majorly been contributed to by the lack of understanding of the consequences and adverse effects of drug use. The community should also take part in ensuring that they create awareness about the dangers associated with hard drugs. Counseling, as an intervention strategy, should be undertaken in the entire country to sensitize people, particularly the youth making them aware of the consequences of becoming addicts (Peacock et al., 2018).
Why the Policy Will Have a Positive Impact on the Youths
According to Curry et al. (2018), the positive impact of the drug and substance policy can only be effective by going into the community to meet with the people and talking to them about how the policy works. While in the community, every member of society will be reached, but the youths will be the primary targets. Talking with the members of the community will create an opportunity to elaborate on how lifestyle diseases contribute to premature deaths and hence the need to change lifestyle patterns. For the policy to be effective, it is a necessity it becomes a community project and people should be encouraged to attend the project to learn more about how to minimize the risks of premature deaths. Through the project, the main focus will be to help the needy within the community. For people to accept your requests, you must provide material and emotional support such that when introducing an idea to them, they will take it seriously.
Community Engagement
The community is the one that suffers the consequences of drug abuse through bad activities committed against it. Their problems should be studied and hope given to the members of the community on how the issues will be solved. Being the most significant element of the policy, the community has the mandate of identifying those people that have fallen into addiction. It becomes easy for the community to achieve this since its members know each other and the community serves as the link through which the people know each other. Once the community identifies the victims of drug abuse, it will be easy to educate the people on how drug abuse is associated with premature deaths. By involving every member of the community, it becomes possible to earn their trust and, with this, the promise the policy will work.
Drug and substance policy correlates to premature deaths mainly due to the understanding premature deaths are associated with lifestyle choices. Shiels et al. (2020) show that screening for specific health risks like alcohol misuse and treating substance abuse is one of the ways that premature deaths can be minimized. At the community level, engaging the members will entail asking questions to get participants’ feedback. Further, the policy will teach the community about the dangers of drug and substance abuse and how it relates to premature deaths. With education comes awareness of the relationship between the two elements. The education will also result in informing the members of the dangers associated with their health. Peacock et al. (2018) show that health relies on nutrition and therefore, lessons on healthy living will be made part of the policy.
Barriers to Community Engagement
Some of the anticipated opposition to the policy and the change associated with it lies in stigmatization. Members of the community who are victims of drug abuse might refrain from showing up at the community project. The failure to show up at the community project will result in the ineffectiveness of the policy since it cannot be rolled out with the key participants, the addicts, missing. The other challenge with policy implementation will be the group being addressed will be large; it will be a challenge to address the crowd. Those who are the victims of drug abuse will have a fear of being stigmatized. Therefore, my team will have a difficult time locating them. With the challenge of stigmatization, it will be difficult to convince every member of society to attend the project.
Communication Media
The approach employed to reach the community and, with it trying to mitigate the barriers that might hinder community engagement will be the use of different media channels of communication. Through posters, I will be able to pass the information about the project by use of graphical synthesis to convey the message to the community. Announcements by the local authorities will serve to ensure that an extensive range of the various regions within the community is reached hence increasing possibilities of attendance from members of every section within the society. For members who mostly use traffic, billboards will be the place to communicate about the policy and premature deaths while the use of local administration will facilitate more awareness among the people. The channels will ensure that the greatest number of people are reached towards increasing the number of attendees to the project.
Collaboration with Partners
By collaborating with various partners within the community, it will be possible to realize the purpose of the project and create awareness among community members on the association between drug and substance abuse and premature deaths. The various partners that will help in the achievement of the implementation of the policy will constitute; community administrators, the clergy and church organizations, drug abuse department, and community members. Priorities that collaborating partners will have in dealing with community members will be to give advice on the prevalence of premature deaths within the society and how to curb the health issue. Local administrators can identify those who have the problem in society and sensitize them on the need to attend the project to learn about the relationship that exists between drug and substance abuse and premature deaths.
Evaluating the Performance
When sensitizing a new policy to the community, the effectiveness of the policy can only be realized by assessing community members on what they have understood. Therefore, evaluating performance is recommendable to find out whether the audience understood the concepts being addressed. For this project’s performance, the evaluation will be achieved through the use of the following approaches. One, the community members will be asked questions on what they learned to ascertain their knowledge level on the relationship between drug and substance use. Two, any questions by the members will be answered by our team to clear possible misunderstandings that might associate with the topic. Third, the members will be given tests; fourth, members will be asked for their contributions as the project is underway, and lastly, feedback will be provided based on questions asked and tests given.
Decision Makers
Decision makers will be used to make the significant decisions that determine how successful the policy will be in helping prematurely curb deaths among the youths in the community. For this policy, the key decision makers will be the members of the community who will be the recipients of the policy, particularly the victims of drug and substance abuse in society. The other significant decision makers in this policy will be policy committee members since they will be responsible for the creation and implementation of the policy and thus, how effective the community will perceive the policy will rely on the policy committee. The local administrators will aid in giving advice on the organization of the project in terms of when and where the event will be held. The other key decision-makers will be church clergy and community leaders.
Procedures for Implementation of the Policy
The procedures for implementing the drug and substance policy are important in ensuring that the policy is implemented according to the people’s will. The respective fundamental steps followed towards implementing the policy constitute training the people on the significance of the policy towards making them understand why it is important and how it will help minimize premature deaths. The second step is getting assurance from the people that the policy is helpful. The step will be an indicator that the people acknowledge the significance of the policy. The third step will be to seek authority from the local health department, as this will be critical in ensuring the policy is implemented. Lastly, implementation is where the members of the community begin to encounter the benefits that associate with the policy in combating premature deaths.
Conclusions
Premature death has been rampant and society needs to work coherently to mitigate the effects by taking care of one another. The major cause for premature deaths, as established in this presentation, was drug and substance abuse. Drug and substance abuse was associated with poor decision-making and hence the relationship between drug abuse and premature deaths. With the association between drug and substance abuse and premature deaths, a need arose to look at the health policies to address the issue. The established policy, drug and substance policy, was successful in how the community was sensitized and educating the public on the relationship between poor health and premature health. However, even with creating awareness, the implementation of the policy encountered several challenges, among them being poor resources and funding.
References
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