Exploring the Impact of Education on Healthcare in Australia

This essay examines the significant impact of education on healthcare outcomes in Australia, focusing on the disparities between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal populations. It highlights the lower life expectancy and higher prevalence of chronic diseases among Aboriginal people due to limited access to healthcare and lower levels of education. The analysis underscores how a lack of education affects health literacy, preventive care, and the ability to navigate the healthcare system. The essay concludes that improving education and healthcare accessibility is crucial for reducing health disparities and improving the overall well-being of Aboriginal communities. Desklib offers resources for students studying public health and related topics.

Impact of education on Healthcare

Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Analysis...........................................................................................................................................2
Current health situation of the Aboriginal people.......................................................................2
Current health condition of the Australians.................................................................................3
Difference in health outcomes of the two groups of people........................................................3
Impact of lack of education on the health outcome of the aboriginals........................................4
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................6
References........................................................................................................................................8

Introduction
Education is one of the biggest pillars to support the social structure of the people. Educational
attainment and the health outcomes of a society are interrelated with each other. The study
focuses on the difference in the health outcomes of the aboriginal and the Torres islander people
and the Australian white people due to lack of education. The aboriginal people were sidelined
by the government for a long time, which has resulted in poor empowerment of those people.
The aboriginal people besides having geographical adversities to access healthcare, they also
choose to avoid modern medicine, as they are completely ignorant of its uses. Proper education
will help to breed healthy habits within the people, which will directly improve the health
outcome of the entire community. Education is the only way out of superstitions regarding
medicine. The study also contains a detailed research on the impact of lack of education in the
health outcome of the aboriginal people.
Analysis
Current health situation of the Aboriginal people
The average life expectancy of the aboriginal male is 69.1 years and the female is 65 years. 34%
of the entire aboriginal population is below 15 years and only 4% of the population is above 65
years. The adults face from a number of chronic diseases such as cancer, asthma, AIDS and so
on. The primary diseases, which are prevalent amongst the indigenous people, are high blood
pressure, diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular diseases and so on. In South Australia, around 32% of
the indigenous people have high blood pressure (Mirowsky, 2017). The indigenous Australians
even suffer from high rates of STIs and Hepatitis B and C (Justo et al., 2017). The mortality rate

of the new born is 2.2 times higher than any other community in Australia (McCalman et al.,
2016). The reason for such high mortality rates is lack of neo-natal care and hygiene related
diseases.
The government for a long time avoided the indigenous people. In the recent years the
government has been trying extensively for the upliftment of the aboriginal populations (Guraya
& Barr, 2018). They have taken up various strategies to send medical care to them. Although,
sometimes the healthcare officials are unable to reach the patients in due time due to the adverse
demographic conditions. Therefore, the indigenous people have to travel long distances and often
to the urban areas to access healthcare.
Current health condition of the Australians
The healthcare system of the Australia provides a high quality service, which has created a high
influence on the health outcome of the people. The average life expectancy of the Australian
people is 82.50 years, which is much higher compared to the indigenous people (Raman et al.,
2017). The non-indigenous people are prone to respiratory diseases like asthma and circulatory
diseases such as chronic pulmonary disease. Some other diseases, which are quite prevalent
among the non-indigenous population, are diabetes, kidney diseases, cancer and so on (Chan et
al., 2017). The overall health outcome of the non-indigenous people is much better than the
aboriginals due to the easy accessibility to the healthcare services. The non-indigenous people
enjoy a lot of schemes and free health services from the government. The high literacy rate of
95.6% allows them to have a good knowledge about various medical conditions, maintain
healthy lifestyle and practice healthy habits. The non-indigenous people have access to three

layers of healthcare: primary healthcare, secondary healthcare and Hospitals. They even receive
government contributions in terms of public health insurance schemes.
Difference in health outcomes of the two groups of people
There is huge gap between the health outcomes of the aboriginal and the non-indigenous people
due to lack of medical care and widespread ignorance. According to the National Aboriginal and
Torres Islander Health Survey, the life expectancy of the indigenous males is 10.6 years lower
than non-indigenous people (Kilgour et al., 2016). Even the indigenous life expectancy of the
females is 9.5 years less than non-indigenous people. The disparity in the health outcomes of the
two groups of people is due to the difference in accessing healthcare system. Lack of education,
forms a huge factor in using the cognitive and the non-cognitive skills in accessing the economic
resources, which in turn affects the healthy habits and the rate of availing the healthcare systems.
The rate of hospitalisation for diabetes of the indigenous people is 4.3 times higher than the non-
indigenous people (Battersby et al., 2018). Even there is a prevalence of high rates of indigenous
people having respiratory diseases like asthma. The indigenous people lead a hard life and most
of the time they are unable to afford the necessities in life. For this reason they tend to succumb
to depression very easily and even have rates of drug abuse amongst them.

Figure: life expectancy difference of the indigenous and the non-indigenous people
Impact of lack of education on the health outcome of the aboriginals
The indigenous people have to face many adversities in terms of accessing healthcare and one
such adversity is lack of education. Education plays an important role in shaping the lifestyle of a
person, by developing the idea of a healthy lifestyle (Gibson et al., 2015). The indigenous people
are unable to understand their health requirements according to their lifestyle and their
demographic features. Due to lack of health related knowledge, they are unable to communicate
their issues to their community members and the local health practitioners. A proper health
outcome is only possible when the people will be able to avail proper treatment, follow the
instructions properly prescribed by the doctor, take timely medications and understand the
importance of timely diagnosis (Zheng et al., 2018).
Healthy habits such as maintaining proper hygiene, eating balanced diet, first aid tips are taught
at school to the children. The children continue to use this knowledge in their lives as well which
helps in keeping them healthy avoid diseases such as diarrhea and dysentery. On the other hand,
when a child misses on education at childhood, he remains uninformed about these healthy
habits. In the aboriginal children, diarrhea was often diagnosed with other diseases as well such
as septicemia, pneumonia and other serious diseases.
Timely vaccinations have proven to avoid many chronic diseases worldwide. The difference
between the rate of immunized indigenous and the non-indigenous children is 8% on a national
level (Fairbrother et al., 2016). This fact can be easily altered with proper awareness about the
importance of vaccines. The gap between the indigenous and the non-indigenous rate of
immunization is due to the lack of education. Only a certain percentage of aboriginal people are

completely aware of the importance of vaccinations and how they protect the body from deadly
viruses(Choo, 2016). Some people are vaccinated due to the persuasion of the local doctors and
some completely refuse to be vaccinated. This scenario rises only due to the lack of education.
When people are educated, they understand the reason behind such diseases and try to learn the
various interventions required to avoid them (Cho et al., 2015). Most of the aboriginals find
vaccinations an attack on their culture and tend to stay away from them due to various rumors
and superstitions.
Education is not only for the children. It is important to educate the adult as well to attain to
close the gap between the differences in health outcome of the two groups of people. Adults
should be educated about the various lifestyle choices, which lead them to have certain diseases
at an alarming rate such as, lack of physical activity leads to cardiovascular diseases, obesity and
other chronic disease. Education will also help improve their economic conditions, which is also
one of the main reasons for the high rates of depression, extensive drug abuse by the indigenous
people (Sink et al., 2015). With the help of education, they can choose to create different income
sources, which will improve their social standing and well and thus helping them having a good
mental health

Figure: Relation between poor health and education
Conclusion
Education forms an important determinant of the health outcomes of the indigenous and the non-
indigenous people. Only 78.7% of the aboriginal population is educated and on the other hand,
95.6% of the non-aboriginal people are educated. This discrepancy in the rate of literacy has an
adverse impact on the health outcome of the aboriginal people. Besides the factors of
accessibility to proper healthcare, the illiteracy of the people also adds up the decrease in the
overall health outcome of the people. Improved healthcare facilities and timely diagnosis and
treatment can help in reversing the current situation. Medical knowledge and proper awareness

of the various diseases can only help solve this issue. Education is an important factor, which
will help resolve their financial issues as well, which will further help to reduce the high rates of
depression and drug abuse among the indigenous population. Higher literacy levels are expected
to make lifestyle changes and adoption of healthy habits amongst the aboriginal people.

References
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