The Role of Political Systems in Shaping Public Health Outcomes

This essay examines the intricate relationship between political systems and public health outcomes, highlighting how different political ideologies, such as democracy and dictatorship, impact healthcare policies and practices. It discusses how democratic systems often promote better health coverage and access for all citizens, while authoritarian regimes can hinder public health initiatives due to restrictions on research and limited healthcare privatization. The essay further explores the impact of political involvement on the health sector, noting that better governance leads to improved public health benefits, strong labor associations, reduced socioeconomic inequalities, and better policies for workers, including full-time employment and gender equality. This student-contributed document is available on Desklib, where students can access a wealth of study resources, including past papers and solved assignments.

Running head: SOCIAL DETERMINANTS OF HEALH 1
Social determinants of health
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SOCIAL DETERMINANTS OF HEALH 2
Political systems and ideologies
There are different kinds of political systems including democratic, dictatorship, republic,
monarchy, and communism. Each of them promotes various approaches to public health, for
instance, democracy promotes approaches to health care through the establishment of better
health covers for every member of the society (Busoi, 2010). A good example is the Medicare
scheme in Australia (Currie, Chiarella, & Bickley, 2017). However, dictatorship kind of ideology
destroys the approaches to public health as no one is allowed to conduct research outside the set
limits by the government. In addition, the ruling party does not allow any privatization of the
healthcare making it extremely difficult to boost the delivery of better care services to the
community. A good example is of the recently changed North Korea governance (Tudor &
Pearson, 2015). Such a country faced a nightmare in public health care back in the 1990s due to
poor economic conditions, increased natural disasters, and lack of enough food and energy. In
summary, the promotion of approaches to public health increase with the increase in the freedom
of the citizen to acquire care services.
Impacts on public health policy and practice
As indicated earlier on, the better the governance, the better the approaches to public
health. However, the involvement of a political system and ideology in the health sector impacts
it in several ways including the following. To start with, the public benefits for health are high as
they are offered to everyone as well as there being strong labor associations making the working
conditions favorable as well. Thirdly, there are lower reported cases of income and
socioeconomic inequalities and, finally, better policies for the workers such as the full-time
employment and gender equality as well (Borell, Espelt, & Rodriguez-Sanz, 2018).

SOCIAL DETERMINANTS OF HEALH 3
References
Borell, C., Espelt, A., & Rodriguez-Sanz, M. (2018). Journal of Epidemiology & Community
Health. Retrieved 2018, from NCBI:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2652986/
Busoi, C. S. (2010). HEALTH SYSTEMS AND THE INFLUENCE OF HEALTH SYSTEMS
AND THE INFLUENCE OF HEALTH SYSTEMS AND THE INFLUENCE OF.
HEALTH SYSTEM, HEALTH POLICY , 4-6.
Currie, J., Chiarella, M., & Bickley, T. (2017). Privately practising nurse practitioners’ provision
of care subsidised through the Medicare Benefits Schedule and the Pharmaceutical
Benefits Scheme in Australia: results from a national survey. Australian Health Review.
Tudor, D., & Pearson, J. (2015). North Korea confidential: private markets, fashion trends,
prison camps, dissenters and defectors. Tuttle Publishing.