Healthcare is a complicated phenomenon that is influenced by many different factors. They belong to various spheres of life, precisely the social, economic, cultural, and political ones. It is necessary to take into account these spheres’ influence on the healthcare system because it is quite ambiguous and may be either positive or negative. It is also worth mentioning that the determiners of each individual’s health may differ from the determiners of the population’s health. Thus, the latter should be analyzed when speaking about the influence that social, cultural, and other factors have on the US healthcare system.
Social factors are the first that come to mind when speaking about the influence on healthcare, primarily because a better socio-economic situation of a family or a person, as a rule, contributes to better health conditions. The research showed that early life and education interventions help reduce the risks of cigarette, alcohol, or drug abuse in teenagers, which is beneficial for their health conditions (Islam, 2019). Moreover, better education options often lead to more prestigious jobs that positively affect personal well-being. As a result, people who earn enough may get qualified medical help and examinations, which reduces the risk of severe disease development.
At the same time, it is necessary to understand the influence of socioeconomic factors may not always be positive, and there exist scenarios in which they may harm the healthcare system. One of the most evident negative outcomes concerns the fact that people with lower income often do not get high-quality medical help because they are not able to pay for it. It also should be mentioned that it is harder for the black and Hispanic population of the US, especially with the tough economic situation, to get qualified medical services (Asad & Clair, 2018). Moreover, children from such families often engage in cigarette, alcohol, or even drug abuse because they may not know all the possible negative consequences of such actions for their health. However, the US government is trying to solve the problem and providing low-income population groups with high-quality healthcare. Thus, the current US healthcare policy may turn the negative socio-economic factors into positive ones.
When speaking about the influence of political factors on the healthcare system, it will be necessary to point out that the situation is more stable in countries with less population inequality ratios. When the focus of the domestic policy lies in higher public spending, compulsory education, and health and safety policies, the risk of lower ratios of population health decreases (McCartney et al., 2019). Apart from that, people in countries with such policies often face a lower degree of social inequality, which also contributes to better healthcare because everyone is equal. Thus, the country’s internal policy should pay attention to reducing the income gap and forming the middle class in order to provide the citizens with better healthcare services.
Taking into consideration all mentioned above, it is possible to conclude that socio-economic, cultural, and political factors have both positive and negative influences on the healthcare system. On the one hand, they enable the citizens with high incomes to get qualified medical help, while people with lower salaries cannot always afford to spend huge money sums on their health. That is why it is important to create policies that target not only the improvement of the healthcare system but the decrease in income inequality as well.
References
Asad, A. L. & Clair, M. (2018). Racialized legal status as a social determinant of health. Soc. Sci. Med., 199, 19-28.
Islam, M. M. (2019). Social determinants of health and related inequalities: Confusion and implications. Frontiers in Public Health, 7(11).
McCartney, G., Hearty, W., Arnot, J., Popham, F., Cumbers, A. & Mcmaster, R. (2019). Impact of political economy on population health: A systematic review of reviews. AJPH. Web.