The terms hygiene and public health have been replaced by preventive and social medicine or social and preventive medicine. Since now-a- days air, water, food and surroundings are polluted, a man has to live and adjust in the conditions of pollution and how far and to want extent he will be able to develop immunity against every sort of pollution is a question mark, infections ate increasing day by day due to pollution, contamination, adulteration and environmental insanitation.
‘Prevention is better than cure’ is an old proverb but now days a great importance is being given to this proverb. A man is a social being. Daily he comes in contact with neighbours, friends, domestic animals and pets. For basic necessities of life he depends on air, water and food which all are polluted and are sources of diseases.
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Similarly he comes in contact with many kinds of micro-organisms which are freely present in air and water which lead to spreading of diseases. Therefore preventive measures must be taken to prevent the spread of diseases.
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This can best be achieved by adopting good habits of cleanliness of individuals and surrounding, using clean water, living in well ventilated and clean rooms, keeping healthy domestic animals and pets and taking medicines for preventing diseases, as in the case of malaria or eye flu epidemic one should take proper medicines or precautions as a preventive measure.
Vaccination must be got done to prevent the spread of diseases. Preventive medicine does not only include vaccine and sera but also include the role of vitamins, minerals, proteins, carbohydrates and fats in the balanced diet.
Social Medicine:
Social medicine is now taking the place of public health .The content of social medicine consists of aspects of health, happiness and efficiency. Its aim includes intensive study of environmental and other factors such as condition of work, home, background, nutrition and social adjustments which cause diseases and application of that study for the benefit of man so as to prevent diseases and promote good health.
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Social medicine is the science and is connected with the community health in respect of social, economic and environmental conditions.
Different authors have expressed social medicine in different names. Professor Winslow defined it as an art of prolonging life and promoting physical and mental health through organized community efforts for the sanitation and environmental control of community infection and also the social machinery which ensures every individual a standard of living, adequate for the maintenance of health.
Diseases can be comparatively easily prevented rather than cured if the basic conditions and cause of the disease is identified. Social and preventive medicine helps to prevent the diseases to a great extent.
Sanitary and hygienic conditions will help in the prevention of disease but will not guarantee for total prevention of disease because there are so many other factors such as social, psychological and economical.
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Which influence the health of a person? Undesirable habits, traditions and conditions of living can be equally responsible for the sufferings of an individual and ultimately community as a whole. Illiteracy, poverty, unemployment, under-employment and economic tensions are other causes of ill health.
Population of the world is increasing fast and with the increase in population the cases of communicable, non-communicable and venereal diseases are also increasing which can be prevented with the help of social and preventive medicine.
Thus the health of the people depends primarily on the social, economic and environmental conditions under which they live and work. Health of a person also depends on water, food, physical surroundings, occupation and standard of living. Underlying all these conditions the main problems of ill health include poverty, illiteracy, family size, malnutrition, poor housing, deep-rooted customs and habits.
Since these are the days of anxiety, worry and tension therefore real happiness and sound health is difficult to achieve. Hence all people are suffering from physical, mental, social or spiritual health.
In rural areas the subject of social and preventive medicine is of great importance due to bad hygienic environmental sanitation. Many diseases can be easily prevented by adopting suitable preventive measures.