Understanding Health: Social Determinants of Health Program for Aboriginal People

This report provides an understanding of the Social Determinants of Health program proposed by the Australian government for improving the health of Aboriginal people. It discusses the aims, objectives, and significance of the program in the Aboriginal community, focusing on areas such as housing, education, and employment. The program aims to address the poorer health and low literacy levels among Aboriginal people and improve their overall quality of life.

Understanding Health

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................4
MAINBODY...................................................................................................................................4
Aims and Objectives of the program “Social determinants of health”........................................4
Identify three areas of social determinant of health program and significance in the aboriginal
life................................................................................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
In Australia lives two type people i.e. aboriginal and non-aboriginal. Aboriginal and
Torres Strait Islander are those people ho are physically unfit and literacy level is too weak. Such
people has high experience of poorer health and greater morality rate as compared non-
aboriginal people. Aboriginal people is also known as indigenous people in Australia. So,
Australian government takes initiative to organize a program i.e. Social determinants of health
(SDOH) to target aboriginal people. This report will discuss about program that proposed by
Australian government and it’s significance in aboriginal life.
MAINBODY
Aims and Objectives of the program “Social determinants of health”
It is health promoting program that is proposed by Australian government to redeem
aboriginal people life. Social determinants of health is a condition in the place wherein people
live, work, learn and plays effective role in reducing health risks and outcomes. The main goal of
the program is to improve quality of life of aboriginal people so that they can feel comfortable
themselves like non-aboriginal people (Cosgrave, Malatzky and Gillespie, 2019). Government
project this program to accomplish number of objectives such as to decline poverty line, decrease
morality rate of aboriginal people, improve literacy and numeracy, improve good health
outcomes and aware aboriginal people to maintain their health themselves. These are the major
objectives behind conducting this program. With this program Australian government wants to
upgrade indigenous community in Australia and improve their lifestyle effectively so that their
new generation can live their life precisely like non-aboriginal people. In this program mainly
targets aboriginal population i.e. older man, young adults and fathers of aboriginal community as
participant for this program because Australian government has aimed to influence the role of
indigenous and Torres Strait Islands partners, fathers, grandfathers and uncles so that they can
actively participate in their children’s and families effectively lives specially in early childhood
development years (Warren and Birrell, 2016). There is a reason behind of targeting only few
aboriginal people such as young adults, fathers and partners are the major stream of family
because they run entire family. When they have knowledge about health hazardous or risk then

they will take care of their child in early stage which will automatically improves children life
and decreases morality rate. Overall Australian government wants to improve health of
indigenous population.
Identify three areas of social determinant of health program and significance in the aboriginal life
With this social determinant health program Australian government wants to determine
three specific areas from political, social, environmental and economical areas and targets them
for aboriginal population. Three specific social determinants are housing, education and
employment that targets by Australian government because these determinants are interlinked
with different areas for example educational social determinants belongs to social areas, housing
determinate relates to social, cultural and economic areas (Stafford and Wood, 2017).
Employment determinates denotes economical, social and political areas. This program targets
these three areas to improve health of aboriginal people. As know housing determinate keeps
people safe from environmental hazardous while educational determinant create sense in
individuals to identify health related issue and make them liable to improve their lifestyle. While
employment determinant provides aboriginal people privilege life. When aboriginal people are
employed then they will enable to give education to their children and make them healthy by
offering proper nutrition food. In this program social workers plays efficient roles because they
involve some activities like cooking classes, music and dance as part of program. The reason
behind is that to stay entertaining targeted aboriginal population and brings positive impact on
their community. For example, social workers encourage targeted aboriginal population to give
high attendance in this program by participating in such activities.
Social workers give cooking classes to young aboriginal adults whereas they learn about
nutrition and it’s significance of healthy eating. Such knowledge supports to improve nutrition
and diet of targeted aboriginal people and their family (Vallesi and et.al., 2018). When aboriginal
children take proper nutrition and healthy diet that will automatically leads high attendance in
school. Effective diet status of children will improve numeracy and literacy skills in them. Poorer
health and greater morality rate in aboriginal people are the major reasons of low literacy level.
In other word, low level of literacy is responsible for the aboriginal condition because they do
not enable to understand significance healthy diet and nutrition. With this program Australian
government address targeted young aboriginal men, older and father that when their own health

will be healthy then they can determine issue of low literacy and can provide best healthy food to
their child. Dance and music activities supports aboriginal to determine their talents of which can
bring financial benefits. There are various aboriginal people in Australian who posses’ god gifted
talent which can redeem their life but they do not get such platform and support wherein they can
show to non-aboriginal people. The min goal of the Australian government is to make aboriginal
people life useful and meaningful so that they can take advantage of all government policies like
non-aboriginal people (Venn and et.al., 2018). Apart from this government provides financial
services to boost this community and raises employment opportunity for them which helps
individuals to make their life useful as well as their families. Social determinates of health is the
name of program that highlight weak areas of aboriginal population which are responsible for
their poorer healthy and targets only those people who can improve health of upcoming
generation. With this program government enables to improve health of individuals of aboriginal
community and improves literacy level in them effectively.
CONCLUSION
This report provided understanding about aboriginal community who suffered from
poorer health issues and possessed low level of literacy. It has concluded significance of social
determinant program that conducted by Australian government to keep hope they will be
achieved expected outcomes in aboriginal community. This initiative proved effective in
aboriginal health because in this program targeted main head of the house i.e. fathers, partners,
young aboriginal men and others as participant and involved activities for improving their
understanding that healthy diet and nutrition required for good life in this report.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Cosgrave, C., Malatzky, C. and Gillespie, J., 2019. Social determinants of rural health
workforce retention: a scoping review. International journal of environmental research
and public health, 16(3), p.314.
Stafford, A. and Wood, L., 2017. Tackling health disparities for people who are homeless?
Start with social determinants. International journal of environmental research and
public health, 14(12), p.1535.
Vallesi, S and et.al., 2018. “In their own voice”—incorporating underlying social determinants
into aboriginal health promotion programs. International Journal of Environmental
Research and Public Health, 15(7), p.1514.
Venn, D and et.al., 2018. Social determinants of household food expenditure in Australia: the
role of education, income, geography and time. Public health nutrition, 21(5), pp.902-
911.
Warren, J.M. and Birrell, A.L., 2016. Trachoma in remote Indigenous Australia: A review and
public health perspective. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Public
Health, 40(S1), pp.S48-S52.