Impact of Social Determinants on Population Health: A Study on First Nation People from Canada

Running head: POPULATION HEALTH
Population health
Name of the student
University name
Author’s note

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POPULATION HEALTH
Introduction
The current study focuses upon the impact of population health upon the social determinants
of health. In order to understand the impact of social determinants of health upon the population
health it is first necessary to identify the various social determinants of health. The social
determinants of health are conditions in which the people are born, live, work and earn. It consists
of the biopsychosocial factors, which impacts the quality of life outcomes of a person. The social
determinants consist of the physical and the economic resources which affect the various life
processes of a person. In the lack of effective economic and social condition the optimal growth and
prospects of a person is limited. Additionally, the lack of support from the society along with poor
economic conditions could limit the access to some of the basic and fundamental resources such as
healthcare, education, employment opportunities. The various social determinants of health often
have a combinatorial effect on the population health.
In the current study, the effect of early life influence upon the first nation population has
been discussed. The early life had profound effects over the mental and physical health of a child.
Additionally, traumatic childhood can severely impact the brain growth and development of a child.
The past life trauma can results in a myriad of health issues in the later stages of life. Some of the
most common effects produced are depressive illness along with hormonal deregulation. In the
current assignment the first nation people have been taken into consideration. The first nation
people here refer to the indigenous population group of Canada. For the current assignment, the
indigenous First Nation people from Canada have been taken into consideration.

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POPULATION HEALTH
Interaction of determinant with upstream, downstream, midstream determinants to impact
health outcomes
The social determinants could be divided into a number of upstream, downstream and
midstream determinants which critical impact upon the health outcomes of people. The determinant
which had been chosen over here is early life influence. Here, upstream determinants refers to
macro determinants, midstream determinants refers to intermediate determinants and the
downstream determinants refers to micro determinants. The global determinants have a huge impact
upon the macro forces. For instance, some of the global recession can affect the tax making policies
of the Government related to health, housing, transport, economic welfare etc. These may impact
the working and the living conditions of the people. This could be further related to the growth and
development for children who had been subjected to poor social and economic conditions at very
early stages of life. The improper availability of finance or excessive cost-cutting by the
government due to global financial crisis could affect the basic resources such as health and
education to increase their charges. As mentioned by Barer (2017), the high transactional cost may
limit the First Nation people from Canada from receiving proper education and healthcare services.
The intermediate factors refer to the psychosocial factors which have pronounced effect
upon the health behaviours of people. Some of the important psychosocial factors are – stress,
perceptions, networks, self esteem, social support, hostility, isolation. As mentioned byStoddart and
Evans (2017), stress and past life trauma could affect the health behaviours of people. As mentioned
bySallis, Owen and Fisher (2015), the past life trauma made people addict to ill health behaviour
such as addiction to alcohol, smoking, undertake improper diet. Some of these have been seen to
have considerable effect over the lifestyle of people. Therefore, early life influences such as
growing up amidst a hostile environment where people would move in tribal groups and derive
nutrition by killing wild animals could have severe impact upon the mental development of an
individual. Moreover, the social isolation and neglect could from early stages of life could harbour

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low self esteem within an individual. These are often replicated into mental illnesses which often
produce a strong impact upon the later fragments of the life of a person. As mentioned by Coyte and
McKeever (2016), the early life psychosocial factors can have profound effect upon the life
attitudes of people. Some of these are presented in their day to day eating habits as well. In this
respect, the Canadian first nation people and children suffer from malnutrition which deteriorates
their health in the later sections of life (Tarasuk et al., 2015). There has been an increased
propensity in the people to be addicted to alcohol and smoking pipes rather than increasing the
intake of fresh fruits and vegetables which they would often substitute with red meat from hunting.
As commented by Desmarais and Wittman(2014), the dearth of fresh fruits and vegetables results
in the lack of important mineral constituent suggest vitamin B12 in the body of the First Nation
people from Canada. The poor nutrition result in an annual Health Care cost of 3 million per year.
Inorder to reduce the magnification within the children of the First Nation people from Canada
which often results in serious health issues the government has started an initiative which is known
as close the gap services (Betancourt, Green, Carrillo& Owusu Ananeh-Firempong, 2016). These
are aimed at providing basic support of living to the First Nation people from Canada by providing
them access to fresh fruits and vegetables along with medications and important health services. It
has been found that community involvement could help in the implementation of the educational
program in at improving the health and lifestyle of the first nation people
The downstream or the micro factors refer to the physiological systems which can affect the
mortality morbidity and the life expectancy of the population. The early childhood dearth of proper
diet could result in weak immunity in adulthood. These are often expressed in the form of hormonal
misbalance and compromised immunity. The hormonal deregulation could also be attributed to
sedentary lifestyle and a dearth of proper and healthy food options. As mentioned by Kennedy,
Kidd, McDonald and Biddle(2017), the rate of type II diabetes is highest among the First Nation
people from Canada. As mentioned by Hystad et al. (2014), the intermediate factors or the