Healthcare Report Australia 2022

Running head: HEALTHCARE
Healthcare
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1HEALTHCARE
Topic: Why do some Australian population groups have poorer health outcomes?
Introduction
Enhancing the health status of the Australian indigenous population that is Aboriginal and Torres
islanders has become a major challenge for the government of Australia. Even in this era, there
exists an immense gap between the health status of indigenous and non indigenous population of
Australia. In this report, two major social determinates of health that are responsible for affecting
indigenous population health in an negative way will be analyzed.
Social determinants of health
The major social determinant of health, affecting the Aboriginal and Torres Islanders is
lack of access to healthcare. While the “closing the Gap policy” have efficiently addressed other
factors leading to poor health outcome, this particular issue has not been addressed in an efficient
way. The indigenous population of Australia, since they reside in remote areas, lacks access to
healthcare institutes. Loyola-Sanchez, Hurd and Barnabe (2017) have pointed out that
communication and cultural barrier between the healthcare service providers and the indigenous
people is another major barrier that is imposing negative impact on their health outcomes (Stone
& Waldron, 2019).
Another major social determinant of health responsible for poor health of the indigenous
population is lower standard of health infrastructure in Indigenous communities that includes
healthy housing, sanitation and food. Considering the fact that majority of the members of
indigenous population resides under the poverty line, lack of financial resources makes it
difficult for them to have proper access to sanitation, housing and food items. Along with
poverty, lack of awareness, high illiteracy rate and lower employment rate can also be pointed