Socioeconomic variables have a significant impact on community’s overall health. Poverty has been shown to harm wellbeing, with many health risks being found to be linked to socioeconomic status. The biological and physiological aspects of medicine are typically the subject of healthy lifestyles. These considerations include salary, job prestige, and educational attainment, among others. This paper aims to identify socioeconomic factors and clarify why they are harmful to one’s health.
Since income affects an individual’s access to healthcare, it forms an essential component of socioeconomic status (SES). Mehraj et al. (2018) states that money enables people to live in a clean, safe neighborhood and purchase nutritious foods. The SES is a significant determinant of healthcare coverage. Low-income individuals are more likely to be Medicaid beneficiaries or uninsured, seek medical attention less often, and receive poor-quality health insurance (Mehraj et al., 2018). Individuals with higher income may obtain quality healthcare more conveniently, live in better housing, and eat more healthy foods, both of which are linked to overall health. On the other hand, more educated people are more likely to learn about healthy habits (Rodrigues et al., 2021). Well-educated patients will identify their healthcare needs better, obey orders, advocate for their families, and interact efficiently with their doctors than the less educated.
SES is inextricably linked to racism, which has hampered minority community members’ socioeconomic advancement. The fact that whites are more likely to undergo a wide variety of specialized medical procedures than African Americans is one form of prejudice. African Americans often experience unfair medical procedures compared to other ethnic groups. Despite the recent focus on reducing health inequalities, this aim cannot be met without concurrent decreases in social class challenges, as social class differences influence racial disparities.
Different legal interventions can provide support to eliminate such health inequalities. For example, the interventions can include free medical treatment and checkup for the elderly and low-income families. Other ways the interventions can help is by providing a cheaper medical insurance, which is affordable to all social classes. Therefore, legal interventions will limit or eliminate cases of inequalities and issues related to difficulties in accessing healthcare facilities and services across all racial groups.
References
Mehraj, V., Cox, J., Lebouché, B., Costiniuk, C., Cao, W., Li, T., Ponte, R., Thaomas, R., Szabo, J., Baril, J., Trottier, B., Cote, P., LeBlanc, R., Bruneau, J., Tremblay, C., … Routy, J. (2018). Socio‐economic status and time trends associated with early ART initiation following primary HIV infection in Montreal, Canada: 1996 to 2015. Journal of the International AIDS Society, 21(2). Web.
Rodrigues, A., Struchiner, C. J., Coelho, L. E., Veloso, V. G., Grinsztejn, B., & Luz, P. M. (2021). Late initiation of antiretroviral therapy: Inequalities by educational level despite universal access to care and treatment. BMC Public Health, 21, 389.