SOC108: Civil Society Advocacy and Global Health Inequities Analysis

This report examines the role of civil society advocacy in addressing global health inequalities, with a specific focus on the efforts of Australian Doctors International (ADI). The paper explores how ADI works to reduce health disparities caused by political, socio-cultural, economic, and institutional factors. It highlights ADI's interventions in areas with poor governance, war-torn regions, and socio-cultural practices that impede health. The report also analyzes how economic factors, particularly poverty, influence health outcomes and how ADI targets impoverished communities. Furthermore, it discusses the impact of institutional weaknesses in healthcare systems and the advocacy efforts to improve them. The conclusion emphasizes the importance of civil society in promoting equitable health standards and the potential of continued advocacy to achieve universal health.

Running head: CIVIL SOCIETY ADVOCACY 1
SOC108: Civil Society Advocacy
Name
Institution

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SOC108: Civil Society Advocacy
Introduction
In the contemporary world, people's welfare has been treated with much consideration
when defining the success of any specific country. Development, in the current world, is
measured through the lens of the welfare of the people. Living standard indices have been the
major tools to measure development in countries. The need to establish civilized and developed
societies is the sole motivation that drives civil societies' actions in many countries. Civil society
advocates attempt to promote sustainable welfare of the people and the world's ecosystem. These
advocates range from human rights, peace, and justice to environmental advocates. Each group
of these advocates specifically aim at improving the welfare of certain individuals. For instance,
the target groups of human rights' civil society advocates are to ensure humans enjoy certain
predetermined and unalienable rights. Peace and justice advocates aim at facilitating peaceful,
fair and just societies. Environmental civil society advocates, on the other hand, attempt to create
a harmonized ecosystem where each element in the world can coexist in harmony. This paper
attempts to investigate the efforts and actions played by Australian Doctors International to
establish curb global health inequalities. The paper aims at pinpointing pieces of evidence that
the civil society is poised to reduce health inequalities caused by political, socio-cultural,
economic and institutional malfunctions across the globe.
Overview
Australian Doctors International is an international non-governmental body which seeks
to improve health outcomes, especially in rural and poverty-stricken areas. The civil body

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provides improved health care for patients who occasionally receive substandard health care.
Australian Doctors International (ADI) headquarters are based in 550C Sydney Road, Seaforth,
2092 New South Wales, Australia. The non-profit organization comprises of professional
medical doctors who volunteer their services towards providing better healthcare conditions to
underprivileged members of the global society (Ng-Kamstra, et al., 2016). The group's mission is
providing improved healthcare by working with local partners which would end up promoting
and upholding the universal rights of better healthcare. The group mainly focuses to improve the
health conditions of people in impoverished communities. The organization is also involved in
civil society advocacy to help people affected by health inequalities due to political, socio-
cultural, economic and institutional factors.
Political Factors
For countries that experience poor leadership and governance in the world, the health
sectors in the countries usually operate at poor conditions. Doctors and nurses in typical
countries are underpaid, work in poor medical conditions. The countries are occasionally
affected by medical staffs' strikes, with the medical union leaders always appearing in headlines
releasing complains and demands. When the national governments fail to come into an
agreement with the doctors, the doctors and medics usually call for national strikes. The people
in such countries are the major victims of these sequential circumstances. To help in reducing the
unbearable circumstance of seeing dying patients due to medical absence, ADI doctors intervene
for the people's benefit. According to Smith & Stewart (2017), health advocacy groups are very
instrumental in reducing the impact of poor governance. Walton-Roberts (2015) adds that highly

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trained doctors from developed economies such as Australia may migrate to poorly governed
countries to help the suffering citizens.
Moreover, in many third-world countries, there are many incidences of politically-
instigated wars and violence. For instance, in the war-effaced Somaliland, the ADI community
offered significant support to the Somali local victims. The doctors in the country continue
helping the injured victims by attending to their desperate health conditions. The doctors are
involved in covering the victims’ wounds and injuries. Moreover, therapeutic help in the form of
counseling is also viable for the affected people. In war-effaced societies, almost all factors in
their economies are effected. The health care sector is greatly affected due to the increasing
number of patients and casualties admitted to hospitals. Moreover, health practitioners in such
countries may fail to report to their work-places, fearing for their security. For victims of war
living in internally displaced peoples' temporary settlements, international health civil society
groups may play big roles in maintaining their health conditions. Williams, et al. (2016) attest
that internally displaced people in war-effaced countries are subjects to violations of their human
rights. For instance, the scholars assert that internally displaced children may miss immunization,
balanced diet and in most cases, are malnourished. It is the role of civil society agencies to come
up with ways to deal with such inefficiencies.
Socio-Cultural Factors
The civil society is also concerned to advocate against social and cultural factors that may
impede the health conditions of individuals in the society. Although Australia Doctors
International appreciate cultural diversity with their different traditions, the organization
discourage primitive traditional rituals that may cause harm to an individual. Many people are

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misled by the notion that socio-cultural factors that inhibit health exist in traditionist African and
Asian countries. However, socio-cultural obstacles to better health inhibitors are also present in
developed countries. Villani & Bodenmann (2017) asserts that there is a need for advocacy
against female genital mutilation (FGM) practices Switzerland. In Australia, FGM is among the
largest challenges facing female children in Australia (Monani, 2018). Australia Doctors
International mitigates the effects of these practices by treating affected victims of FGM. The
organization also offers public awareness campaigns against the practices of FGM. The
organization also engages the public in seminars that aim at combatting the risky practice.
The Australia Doctors International medics also promote healthy conditions among the
civilized Western societies by creating awareness against emerging issues such as obesity. The
organization promotes the need for societies to observe a balanced diet in their meals. The
organization also advocates for the inclusion of clean water in people's dietary behaviors. These
emerging issues have been promoted by the organization's indulgement in their advocacy.
Health, being their major concern, is the central theme in the many seminars and public
awareness campaigns conducted by the organization's medics. The organization aims to increase
the awareness of the perils that follow unhealthy data patterns. Increase of vegetable intake and
decreased intake of gluten foods is also a major message spread by the civil advocacy group. To
guard the consumers, the organization is also involved in testing the edibility of food products.
Volunteer doctors in this group usually conduct many experiments that are meant to ascertain
that the food products sold to consumers are free from substances that may impose danger to the
health of the consumer.

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Economic Factors
Economic factors are the main factors that propelled Australia Doctors International to
extend their hand to certain communities. For most civil societies concerned with establishing
healthy societies, the economic conditions of a society is a chief determinant towards its help.
Many civil society advocates, Australia Doctors International not exempted, target to improve
the health conditions of citizens living in third-world countries. These target groups live below
the poverty line and they live in absolute want. Considering that the people cannot even afford to
get enough food to put on their tables, affording proper healthcare is even more difficult.
Moreover, many third-world countries have poorly facilitated hospitals, with fewer health
practitioners. For instance in Papua New Guinea, a third world country and the most targeted
country by Australia Doctors International, the doctor to patient ratio is estimated to be 1: 17,068
(Rai, Mulu & Jacobsen, 2018). The scholars hold that a considerable large proportion of the
population lives below the poverty line in this country. Moreover, the scholars point out that
despite an estimated 85% of the population lives in a rural area, 50% of the doctors work in
urban areas. These statistics rouse the need to increase medical practice in Papua New Guinea's
rural areas. Considering that the organization’s primary objective is to provide better health
services to needy people in rural areas, Australia Doctors International has assigned a large
workforce in Papua NewGuinea’s rural areas.
Garthwaite, et al., (2016) lament that people in poverty-stricken societies are in desperate
need to reduced health inequalities. The scholars attest that although many governments have
been consciously trying to reduce these health inequalities, there is still an observable gap
between health conditions of the rich and that of the poor. The researchers also confirm that

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health advocacy by public health egalitarians has played a huge role in the attempted reduction
of health disparities. In their conclusion, the researchers are pessimistic that public health
consensus would reduce the health inequalities. The scholars suggest more intense advocacy
about the concept of reducing health inequalities and universalizing health.
Institutional Factors
Australia Doctors International also aims at streamlining the institutional inadequacies in
different countries around the globe. Health institutions in low-income countries postulate a
characteristic tendency to have weaker health institutions as compared to countries in high-
income countries. The weakness of institutions in low-income countries is attributed to many
factors including poor governance, semi-skilled human capital, fewer resources and poor
technology as compared to healthcare systems in high-income countries (Sapkota, van Teijlingen
& Samkhada, 2014). These weak institutions are the characteristic poor performance of health
centers in low-income countries. Civil society health advocates and interest groups attempt to
improve the health conditions of people living in such societies by providing their availing their
professional human capital and technology to these areas. These advocates also work hand in
hand with the institutions to restructure and reorganize them.
Health advocates also intervene in situations where the existing health institutions are
biased towards their patients. The biases may be in the form of social status, tribe, races or
ideological difference. A case example is the health system in South Africa during the apartheid
period. During this time, a public health practitioner operating in a hospital designed for white
people could not render services to a deserving black person. A doctor in an ‘only whites'
hospital could rather watch a black man dying than attend to him in the hospital. Civil society

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advocates were against such divisions and fought for equal treatment of patients. According to
the advocates, public medical practitioners should ensure that their activities are patient-centered
(Huber, et al., 2016). The scholars hold that these biases are signs of institutional weaknesses.
Medical should disregard ethnicities, tribes, clans, races, social status, political and religious
ideologies in their practices.
Conclusion
To conclude, the efforts played by civil societies in stabilizing the existing health
inequities cannot be left unsaid. Civil society intervention and involvement in curbing political,
social-cultural, economic and institutional causes of health disparities has been very instrumental
in achieving balanced and universal health standards. The actions of Australia Doctors
International organization are also visible in reinstating proper health conditions in the various
countries the organization has employed their doctors. The doctors in this organization volunteer
to offer their professional services to the less fortunate around the globe. Although health
advocacy has not yet been able to combat health inequality, continued advocacy efforts could
eventually realize the venerable goal.

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