Healthcare Policy, Power & Politics: A Comprehensive Analysis

This report delves into various aspects of healthcare policy, power, and politics in healthcare provision. It discusses the policy cycle as a tool for developing new policies, highlighting its flexibility and adaptability. It differentiates between the 'new' and 'old' public health approaches, emphasizing the shift towards sustainable health improvement and addressing social determinants of health such as income, social status, and employment conditions. The report further examines the role of power in policy development and change, including political power and its impact on policy outcomes. Finally, it addresses policy considerations for a national obesity health campaign, emphasizing the importance of policy, issues, and politics in achieving effective prevention strategies. This student contributed document is available on Desklib, where students can find a wealth of study resources.

Running Head: HEALTH CARE 0
POLICY, POWER &
POLITICS IN HEALTH CARE
PROVISION

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1) The main aim of policy cycle is to make sense to the public servants in relation with policy
task with planning out a sequence of steps to turn ideas into recommendations and thus offer
a suitable structure considering the process of policymaking (Howlett, 2009). With the help
of institution of government, public servants can be benefitted while developing in extent
with policy cycle approach. This cycle begins with an issue, look up for mark, tests plans, and
offer suggestions (Nill & Kemp, 2009). The results are related to evaluations and the cycles
began others. Policymakers found this beneficial as policy cycles offer a flexible and modest
framework and whatever it's flawed, the policy cycle does not suffer from the rationalist
tendencies. Moreover, the government also not required to select between content and
processes between politics and consultation. Policy is known to be a sequence of
interconnecting steps and a policy process is more than a decision plays among politician and
interests (Walt et al, 2008).
In developing a new policy, the cycle can be beneficial in various sorts as it can be implement
to wholly political systems and yet it is simple and understandable. The importance of cycles
shows flexible policymaking and also there is a broad range of significant learning depend on
analysis of specific levels – such as the bottom-up versus top-down approach to the domain
of policy formulation. In these procedures, the academic idea is simple and the resulting
instruction to policy practitioners is straightforward. It is tough – but not impossible – to
define a more realistic, more meaningful, analytical model to policymakers (and provide
suggestions on how to act) in the same straightforward way (Head, 2008).
Hence, this model helping the entrepreneur or policy practitioner to comprehend the broader
picture which is important in the development and successful execution of a policy.
3) The health of people is threatened by various factors comprising disease, environmental
factors, unhealthy lifestyle, social inequality and all that undermine health. All these
problems are counteracted with various public health actions. With new public health
approach, the need to develop on new changes charging from past decade and shifting away
from the prevalence of the medical model in extent with sustainable health improvement
(Frohlich & Potvin, 2008).
In addition, actual and perceived blockades in past have abridged health of people to a
classified, fragmented and as a consequence, less in effect programme. Practitioners of Public
health were challenged to involve within their role advocacy among the wider series of
economic, social, and environmental problems and to take best out from clusters of cross-

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disciplinary dimensions, practices and theories and build up a sustainable and integrative
approach to creating health (Craig et al, 2012).
Six main methodologies to people health practice executed among earliest time and the
modern era and these comprises – (1) Health Protection (antiquity–1830s), (2) Miasma
control (1840s – 1870s), (3) Contagion Control (1880s – 1930s), (4) Preventive medicine
(1940s-1960s), (5) Primary health care (1970s-1980s) and (6) Health Promotion (1990s-
present) (Frieden, 2010). The first approach is concern with public health as health
protection, facilitated through societies’ social structures. The second approach is related to
shaping of a unique public health discipline by the sanitary movement and the third approach
include public health as contagion control. Moreover, the fourth approach includes public
health as protective medicine and similarly, the last approach is linked with the “new public
health” – health promotion.
Finally, because of the new health promotion paradigm, it will ensure healthy conditions for
people in the 21st century as today’s world is characterized by perverse issues of poverty,
emerging diseases, global inequality and constant conflicts—problem that need more radical
public health contexts than that of the new public health (Sorensen et al, 2012).
4) Some important social determinants have become sociological issues to the health of
person. These sociological issues are low level of income, low social status, poor
employment conditions, low rate of literacy, poor childhood experiences, no access to health
services and unhygienic conditions in which they live (Braveman et al, 2011). For example-
Torres Islanders and aboriginals face several sociological issues that hampers their living.
Although, they were the first persons of Australia but they are invisible currently due to low
population. Employment rate of Aboriginals is very much low when as compared to natives
of Australia. The residential areas of Torres islanders are economically separated from the
mainstream economy of Australia (Mackenbach, 2012). With low income, these people do
not get easy access to other facilitates that is accessed by native Australians. The aboriginal
population do not get equal and easy access to opportunities such as housing, childcare, law
media, community planning, business, transportation, and agriculture. The above mentioned
facilities are shaped by unequal income distribution, distribution of power at local, global,
and national level.
Other social conditions where people are born, work, live, learn, function with wide range of
health issues, and quality of risky lives (Haslam, 2009). Apart from this, social exclusion,

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poor housing, and residential conditions have easy access to the resources in order to meet
daily amenities such as safe housing and local food in remote areas. One of the most
important amenity problem is lack of sanitation in water supply where high-income groups
have easy access to high water quality. Social exclusion happens because of discrimination,
stigmatisation, and unemployment. Few factors such as discrimination based on race,
disability, sex, culture and gender that limits the opportunities of participation (Connell,
2012). These social exclusions hamper the health and psychology by continuous stress.
5) Policy development and change is a sort of ‘analytical method’ and a portion of ex-ante
measurement arrayed by many agencies comprising the government, to pre-test diverse
policies and programmes in extent to their impact prior to launching this filly on a larger
scale (Gaventa & Cornwall, 2008). Policy change as a large scale economic, social and
political change follow-on political act, and the communication of people inside policy
community; and it is based on interest and power (Howlet, 2014). Every single policy
program change may be symbolic or substantive, a rearrangement of responsibilities amid the
main interested party and therefore a change in the control site of a policy sector.
Considering evaluation of public policy, power is an important aspect, which learns the
behaviour and interests of participants concerning policies and the attainment of a policy
objective. In addition, power is not localised in a specific kind of organisations but it
traverses the social procedure to develop knowledge. Boulton (2010) argued that power is
located at the close to structure and it is relative and applied in three scopes i.e. – power over
political agendas, power over decisions and power over non-decisions.
Political power is required for altering people policy but the changes in policy also impact
power changes. Considering many studies, it can be said that substantive and symbolic policy
changes carry about power gains for particular public bureaucracies in complete terms.
However issues of ‘meaning’ can be improved assessed by improving the knowledge base for
learnt policymaking, issues of ‘power are require greater levels of arrangement and sharing
between shareholders to approve on suitable and preferred progressions of policy action for
the future, depend on the visions extended from well-crafted plan experimentations (Mintrom
& Norman, 2009).
6) Considering health of the nation, obesity is one of the major issues. There is need for
documentation of health risks in prevalence of obesity and some of major known elements of
obesity signifies dietary behaviour and physical activity (Puhl & Heuer, 2010). Many health

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organisations have led energies to encourage policy, system, and environmental change and
also encouraged practitioners to deploy physical and nutrition policies.
The policymaking process and considerations have been defined as comprising of three areas
– policy, issues and politics (Malik, Willett & Hu, 2013). In policy domain, its concerns
about analysing policy solutions that assess issue of focus and that to survive finally receive
serious consideration including technical feasibility and expectancy of future restrains. Policy
considerations include six main activities i.e. (a) assessing the political and social
environment, (b) engaging, educating and collaborating with key stakeholders, (c)
recognising and framing the issue, (d) utilizing existing mark, (e) recognising policy
resolutions, (f) develop and support political will (Beaglehole et al, 2011). All these activities
help in simplifying effective policy improvement with assessment of current social and
political situation. There is no sequential order of these activities rather all may come into the
place of the problem, policy and politics in respect with area of policy process. Public health
efforts to push prevention of obesity more emphasis on policy, system and environment
approach. With the building and implementation of adequate plan considerations are
significant as it endorses improved efficiency and effectiveness in progressing policies for the
prevention of obesity (Gearhardt et al, 2011). It is also important that policymakers respond
surely to the applications of policy that bring out the provision of their constituencies
comprising community leaders, public officials, organised cooperative groups, and the public.
It is also important to address the native situation and work collectively to develop provision
across all the stakeholders.

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