Question

The United States’ health-related views and laws are shaped by social, political, and historical factors that are often part of the larger debate over individual rights versus the collective good. Based on this idea please discuss your thoughts on the 3 following public health topics.

• Should childhood immunizations be mandatory or optional?

• Should higher insurance rates or taxes be used to punish poor health choices (e.g., cigarettes, “junk” food)? Would this be unfair to individuals, or is this fair since all Americans pay a portion of the healthcare costs to care for people who make these choices?

• Should, in light of the current Covid-19 situation, should we be required to social distance, wear masks when we are in public, and be on lockdown when community numbers are higher?

Answer 1

Should childhood immunizations be mandatory or optional?

The immunization in children in the forms of vaccine has always and more recently seen a trend of concern amaong many cotries across the world and with many parents. Immunization/vaccination has been by far the most effective tool available in the field of public health to control, prevent and treat various diseases. By making the immunization mandatory we ensure the carpet complance and assure the prevention and good immunity development among the children to fend off any disease and lead a healthy life. If immunization are made optionaly, then part of the communicty remain vulnerable and this leads to resurgence of diseases which could easily be prevented by vaccination. The optional vaccination in child population affects the children who due to medical reasons vaccination is not possible and herd immnity is not being developed in this population. mandatory vaccination is like a social contract to be made mandatory to prevent diseases and provide our children a safer and healthier future. There have been side-effects of vaccination and if you consider the number of children vaccinated and children with side-effects, we can see that there is negligible risk and associated illness which can be treated and majority cases are non-fatal in nature. So childhood immunization should indeed be made mandatory to protect our children from vulnerability to dangerous contageous disease and offer a healthy and safe future.

Should higher insurance rates or taxes be used to punish poor health choices (e.g., cigarettes, “junk” food)? Would this be unfair to individuals, or is this fair since all Americans pay a portion of the healthcare costs to care for people who make these choices?

Punishment in the form of higher insurance and taxes for poor health choices can seem to be an effective choice in the short term but its impact in the longer run needs to be considered. The population of the people with poor health choices cannot be applied and presumed for the total poluation of the country. The poor health choices are choices made by the individuals which can be treated/intervened by public campaining, targeted health laws and specific taxation. A blanket taxation and higher insurance rates adversely affects the lower income strata of the population where healthcare insurance is a necessity as low income cannot cover all the medical costs of the household. The higher insurance rates would definately be unfair to the individual free from poor health choices and maintaining a healthy and clean lifestyle. The current ttrent of the health choices has been towards clean and healthy living and in such scenario higher insurance rates and unnecessary taxation can lead to pubic disappointment and loss of confidence towards the healthcare sector and lower insurance coverage. The burden of the poor health choices definaely falls upon the American taxpayers and it is unfair to punish the entire population for a section of population with insurance rates and taxes. Instead a low tax and targeted policy making can be considered for promoting healthy lifestyle and rehabilitation/treatments/ interventions for people with poor health choices. Insurance is at par with fundamental right of the american people and high taxation and bloated insurance rates affects everyone unfairly.

Should, in light of the current Covid-19 situation, should we be required to social distance, wear masks when we are in public, and be on lockdown when community numbers are higher?

The currend COVID19 is a pandemic and has affected everyone and posed a serious threat to public healthy and the healthy of the country in all aspects. The vaccine for the COVID19 virus is in developmental process and there is not method/mean available to treatment of the disease. In such situation prevention of the virus is our best option towards a cure at the moment. The more we apply preventive measures such as wearing masks, social distancing, washing hands, healthy lifestyle the more we have a chance of not being affected by COVID19. We should indeed avaoid mass gahtering as it can spread to a larger population and adversely engulf larger areas which can put children, elderly, diseased population in unnecessary risk of fatal health outcomes. For this reason wearing masks can control infection at an individual level, maintaining social distancing can help with community tranmission of the infecton and a targeted lockdown at affected zones can help the country to minimize the impact and protect public health and safety. So in the light of the COVID19 pandemic we should definately follow social distance, wear masks, avoiding large gathering and other safelty measures.