Women's Health in Australia: Social Determinants and Primary Health Care

Running head: GLOBAL HEALTH
GLOBAL HEALTH
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Introduction
Australia is a sovereign country which comprise mainly of the Australian continent, the
island of Tasmania and several other smaller islands. It is called as the largest country of
Oceania. It is also stated as the world’s sixth largest country by total area (Willis, Reynolds &
Keleher, 2016). In Australia, health care is largely provided by private medical practioners. It is
also provided by government and private operated hospitals. It is the mixed public-private health
care system and is ranked second best in the developed world (Duckett & Willcox, 2015). Both
women and men are predisposed to various types of diseases. The genetic, biological and
behavioral differences between both genders led to higher health risk among women in Australia.
As per literature, a large number of issues have been noted among the women health which
remains unreported (Dawson et al., 2017). This assignment will mainly be based on the
description of the women health condition in the nation. Moreover, it will also discuss three
important social determinants of women health in the nation. This would be followed by the
discussion how primary health care of the nation has been addressing the women heath issues. It
will also be showcasing how social and economic policies have impacted the health conditions of
the women in the nation.
Australian health care system
The national agency in Australia responsible for health and welfare information and
presenting statistical data is the “Australian Institute of Health and Welfare” (AIHW). This body
develops 140 reports every year on health status. The federal initiatives of Australian health care
are Medicare responsible for health service subsidies. The development of healthcare sector in
the country has led to increase in the life expectancy of the population. Australian government
system of Medicare (Australia’s universal health care system) had helped people to cope up with

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their healthcare cost (Milner, Smith & LaMontagne, 2015). Medicare funds large part of the
health care services. The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme offers subsidized medication to
patients. The regulatory body of medical devices and the medicines is the Therapeutic Goods
Administration (Meadows et al., 2015).
In Australia, WHA or Women Health Care Australia is the peak body for hospitals
oriented towards women health. Hospitals providing maternity care and other health service to
women in Australia directly work under WHA. It serves 110 maternity services across
Australia.. It is the largest woman health advocacy. Some of the special interest groups of WHA
includes are, “Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Women's & Children's Health”, “Maternity
services” and many more (Duckett & Willcox, 2015). Despite several developments, women
health is of major concern in Australia.
Women health issues that are important
Most chronic and disabling disorders which are affecting women in Australia are heart
diseases and stroke (Byles et al., 2015). Cardiovascular disorder is affecting considerably a larger
proportion of females in this nation. Currently Australian government is considering this disorder
to be the most dreaded disorder in the nation. This is reflective from the fact where 209.8/100000
deaths are occurring from heart attack, stroke as well as vascular diseases among females. This
rate is considerably higher in the elder female cohorts. Ischemic as well as coronary heart
diseases occur mainly due to build up of a large number of plaques in the different blood vessels
(Dobson et al., 2015). This is resulting in angina and heart attacks to a large number of women
per year. Increased levels of obesity are mainly considered to be the main cause behind the

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development of heart disorders in women. A study also suggests that the burden experienced by
women from stroke is 2% higher in comparison to that of the males (Schmied et al., 2015).
Numerous types of cancer are affecting women in the nation. The burden of cancer
among women of the nation is found to be dominated by breast cancer followed by lung cancers.
Together these are actually resulting for about 60% of all the cancers in the nation. According to
Australian Bureau of statistics, breast cancer is the 2nd most common cause of death from cancer
in females (Torre et al., 2015). Australia ranks 17 in the entire world with 86% in age
standardized rate per 100000 in world (Yu et al., 2015). The prevalence of new breast cancer
cases among Australian women in 28.4% as per 2017 reports. There are 17586 women newly
affected by breast cancer in 2017. Total number of deaths among females in 2017 due to cancers
was 19453. The total number of new cases among females due to lung cancer was 18/100,000
persons in 2017 (Dasgupta et al., 2017).
Other women related issue that is also getting pronounced in the Australian context is the
several disorders related to mental health. Depression related issue is one of the most common
mental disorders which is affecting the women of the nation that had accounted for about 4.8%
of the total diseases burden on the women (Hayman et al., 2015). Post partum depressions are
found to be yet other contributors to the increasing rate of mental health disorders in Australia. It
is affecting up to 15% of the childbearing women (Schmied et al., 2013). A marked difference is
found in the health conditions of that of the aboriginal women (Milner, Smith & LaMonatge,
2015). It is astonishing to found that the life expectancy of such women are found to be 20 years
shorter than that of the non-aboriginals. However the diseases by which they are affected are
more or less similar to that of the non-Indigenous Australian women (Gausia et al., 2015). The
mortality rates of the Indigenous women are 2.8 times higher than Non-Indigenous women in