Overview
The United States of America has invested heavily on public healthcare in its effort to reduce public health issues that affect its people. For instance, the government has had campaigns and programs that are aimed at reducing or eliminating the HIV/AIDS pandemic and infant mortality. Despite the efforts, the United States has one of the uppermost HIV/AIDS prevalence and child death rates as compared to other mechanized and urbanized countries. The purpose of this paper is to compare the HIV rates and infant mortality cases of the United States with the situation in a developed country such as the United Kingdom) and a developing nation such as Kenya.
Comparison of infant mortality rates and HIV rates
According to Holtz (2013), the United States has the highest healthcare expenditure per capita in the world. Consequently, it has invested heavily in healthcare programs to reduce different healthcare issues in its population. Although the country has made significant steps towards the reduction of HIV and infant mortality, the issues still remain of great public health concern (UNAIDS, 2013). For instance, the country lags behind the United Kingdom in terms of the quality of healthcare that is available to its population, despite the fact that its healthcare expenditure per capita is more than double that of the UK (Holtz, 2013).
The HIV prevalence rate in the United States stands at 0.6%. Although this figure is low, it is still higher than that of other developed countries, including the United Kingdom whose prevalence rate stands at 0.3% (Public Health England, 2013; UNAIDS, 2013). However, both countries have lower HIV prevalence rates as compared to that of Kenya whose prevalence rate is 6.1% as per 2013 estimates (NACC, 2014). On infant mortality, Kenya has a higher rate than both the United States and the United Kingdom at 40.71, 6.17, and 4.44 per 1000 live births respectively (CIA, 2014).
The US can learn important lessons from the United Kingdom’s public healthcare system through which different healthcare programs have been put in place to reduce both the HIV and infant mortality rates in the country. For instance, in the United Kingdom, the National Health Service (NHS) provides free HIV treatment for all citizens and visitors (Public Health England, 2013). On the contrary, the United States has not been able to offer universal free HIV treatment.
Only people who have good medical insurance can easily access such treatment (UNAIDS, 2013). In a country where over 46 million people are insured, the implication is that a large number of people lack sufficient access to HIV therapy. The problem of insurance also affects the infant mortality rate in the US where the poor and uninsured record higher infant mortality rates than other people in the society (CIA, 2014). The US can learn a lot from the UK, which has comprehensive cover towards maternity healthcare for all women to ensure excellent prenatal and postnatal care and hence less birth complications and infant mortality (Holtz, 2013).
Kenya, which lags behind the US in both HIV and infant mortality rates, can learn valuable lessons for its public healthcare system. For instance, although the country has put out more funds and resources towards the creation of awareness on HIV and maternal healthcare, the efforts have only been concentrated on major urban and population areas, thus leaving out rural areas and minority groups, which are currently driving the rates of HIV and infant mortality in the country (NACC, 2014). The US has made successful efforts to create awareness on HIV on minority groups such as African Americans and MSM (men who have sex with men), which have higher HIV prevalence rates than the national average. Such efforts should be replicated in Kenya.
Impact on nursing practice
In the light of the growing public health issues across the world, nursing plays an important role in determining the healthcare outcomes in a population. Nursing plays an important role in health promotion and protection activities. It has the capacity to create a big difference, especially in the success of healthcare programs and activities towards HIV and infant mortality reduction in the world (Holtz, 2013).
Countries that have a high number of healthcare providers in relation to the population are healthier. They report lower prevalence across different healthcare issues (Holtz, 2013; Salvage, 2009). For instance, the UK, which has better healthcare outcomes for its healthcare programs, has a higher number of nurses per population in relation to the US and Kenya. The UK has 980 nurses per 100,000 people as compared to the US at 874 per 100,000 and Kenya at 80 per 100,000 (NACC, 2014; Holtz, 2013; Public Health England, 2013). The number of nurses in the population as evidenced by the disparities between the countries on HIV and infant mortality rates affects the health of the population.
Summary
In conclusion, it is evident that despite the efforts on improving the quality of public healthcare, HIV and infant mortality are still major public health issues of concern in developed countries, including the US and the UK and in developing countries such as Kenya. While the UK has better healthcare outcomes for its population relative to the US, Kenya lags behind both countries. This situation can be attributed to the disparities on the quality of healthcare in the three countries. Nurses can play an important role in improving the healthcare outcomes for initiatives on HIV and infant mortality reduction in all countries and hence the need for them to be involved proactively in public healthcare initiatives.
Reference List
CIA. (2014). Country Comparison: Infant Mortality Rate. Web.
Holtz, C. (2013). Global Health Care: Issues and Policies. Sudbury, MA: Jones & Bartlett.
NACC. (2014). Kenya AIDS Response Progress Report. Nairobi, Kenya: National AIDS Control Council (NACC).
Public Health England. (2013). HIV in the United Kingdom: 2013 Report. London: Public Health England.
Salvage, J. (2009). The nursing contibution to primary healthcare worldwide. Primary Health Care , 19(5), 24-26.
UNAIDS. (2013). UNAIDS Global AIDS Response Progress Reporting 2013: United States of America Country Progress Report. New York, NY: UNAIDS.