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Summary Unit 4- Health and Human Rights Notes
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Health, human rights & interventionsHuman development
Traditionally, development is very difficult to define as it refers to an improvement in
various characteristics but not necessarily all of them.
Examples of development are:
o An improvement in demographic conditions (falling birth rates, increasing life
expectancies). This may be seen in the DTM.
o Economic progress (increases in GDP)
o Social improvements such as equal rights for women, better race relations, & a
greater participation in the political process.
Development also may mean improved freedom for people and quality of life as well as
greater access to natural resources.
Increasingly, development includes an element of environmental sustainability.
Measuring Development
Traditionally, the most common statistics used to measure development revolve around
money & the economy (GDP, GNP).
Around 15% of global population live in areas with high GDP/capita & 56% with low.
However, these statistics don’t take into account wealth distribution, as there may be
regional variations. Also the cost of living isn’t taken into account &
social/environmental costs of development aren’t shown.
The Human Development Index (HDI) is a popular measure of development’ & was
created in 1990. It is made up of three aspects of development:
o Living a long and healthy life,
o Being educated,
o Having a decent standard of living.
HDi is calculated by life expectancy at birth, adult literacy rate, GDP per capita &
combined enrolment ratio. This means some countries may score very highly despite
being unequal due to their high GDP. (Qatar is 33)
Also, in many Muslim countries, women may not want to go to school (against Sharia
law) & therefore they will score low down.
In recent years, people have recognised that the relationship between human happiness
& levels of wealth are complex.
The Happy planet index is an alternate way of measuring development. The index
measures sustainable wellbeing & how nations are achieving longer & healthier lives.
Western countries which are often seen as more successful in other measures often
score lowly due to their ecological footprint (the USA is 104 th out of 140 compared to
10th in HDI). It calculates a score based on:
o Experienced Wellbeing: People are surveyed on their ‘well being’ using a scale
from 1-10.
o Life Expectancy.
, o Ecological Footprint: it looks at the amount of land required to sustain a
country’s resource consumption.
Rosling, who created Gapminder, believes that improvements in environmental quality,
health, life expectancy & human rights are more significant goals of development whilst
economic growth is the best way of delivering them.
Education
Education is key to economic development (people can get better paid jobs), human
rights creation & the understanding of human wellbeing. However, this view isn’t shared
globally, as there are attitudes to gender equality which hinder access to education &
achievement.
This varies greatly among countries. For example, more men are literate than women in
the whole of India. However, Kerala (in India) has equal numbers of educated men and
women.
Human health & life expectancy
There are numerous reasons for variations in health & life expectancy across the world.
These are:
o Health care- The smaller the number of people per doctor, the better the care.
Also, some countries offer free health care (UK) where as in others (USA) it is very
expensive. Some countries do not have access to basic medicines such as those
on the World health organisation’s drug list (e.g. paracetamol & ibroprofen).
o Economic development- richer countries have better access to medical
technology & so may treat diseases which others see as incurable.
o Education- In many countries, people have learned the importance of eating
healthy & living a healthy lifestyle as well as sanitation, contraception & childcare
which may not be present in others. (Kerala (a region in India which places a lot of
emphasis on education & equality) has a life expectancy of 74 & fertility rate of
1.7 compared to 64 & 2.4 in the rest of India).
o Age- The old are more susceptible to diseases so in an aging population, the
death rate may be higher.
o Food & water supply- A good food & water supply prevents the spread of disease
& malnutrition.
o Culture & lifestyle- In Afghanistan, women can’t be seen by male doctors & there
are very few female ones as they can’t be educated to become doctors/nurses,
limiting their healthcare. On the other hand, traditional food in the
Mediterranean are culturally believed to increase life expectancy.
Life expectancy may also vary within a country for example in the UK; the life expectancy
of a man in London is 80, compared to 72.4 in the North West. This may be due to
London having a higher GDP/capita (£40,215), compared to the North West (£19,937),
meaning they have more to spend. Also a fewer percentage of people smoke in London
(17%) compared to the North West (22%), as the North West is poorer; generally
meaning the tendency to smoke is higher.
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