Strengthening public health capacity through a health promotion lens

Public health systems across the world are under severe pressure. Although most health systems are still largely focused on treatment, cure, and care (Beaglehole and Dal Poz, 2003), the growing burden of non-communicable diseases, with a double burden of chronic and infectious diseases in low- and middle income countries, creates increasing and shifting demands on health care and public health services. At the same time, widening health inequalities, increasing antimicrobial resistance, and globalization are a threat to the very existence of the global public health system (Garrett, 2003). Rampant infectious disease such as the H1N1 influenza pandemic of 2009, the outbreaks of Ebola in West Africa and of the Zika virus in the Americas, and the recent cholera epidemics in Yemen and Cote d ’Ivoire, bring out the shortcomings of the ability of health systems to prepare for and respond to public health emergencies.
Source: Health Promotion International - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research