Children, The Family and Health: What it Takes to Give Children Long Life
The Singapore Workshop: “Children are our most valuable resource for the future,” John F Kennedy
Much attention has been given by media to the dangers that beset families as we move towards the 21st century, including health and hygiene, disease, safety in the home, mental health illness, drug and alcohol abuse, nutrition, parenting practices and relationships. The health of children is important to future generations and societies have a social and ethical responsibility to ensure that our children are provided with opportunities which optimise their health and wellbeing.
Australian health practices are well devolved and both Federal and State Governments fund structured departments, which provide human and physical resourcing for the application of health practices and research into the same. Recently, the noted decline in childhood immunisations caused concern amongst the community. The Commonwealth Government introduced an Australia wide campaign to immunise all primary school aged children for Measles, Mumps and Rubella. This campaign was a huge success with schools notating an 85% take-up rate across the country.
Schools have historically played an important role as a setting for the delivery of health development programs including nursing, medical and dental services in addition to health education and promotion programs. Health and education outcomes are inextricably intertwined as children’s emotional, social and physical health status impacts on their learning outcomes during school years. The health problems of school age children are exacerbated by income inequality, unstable family structures, deteriorating social networking as well as limited access to health care of support services. These of course, vary according to geographic location in such a large country.
Outcomes for children with health, developmental or educational concerns improve greatly if these are detected in early childhood and appropriate intervention strategies are applied. This relates directly to developmental delay, literacy problems and hearing and vision impairment. Children with more severe medical problems can receive equal access to health education through Special Schools. All early detection strategies are well ensconced in Education Departments’ Students at Educational Risk Policies and applied in schools around the country.
Schools too, may offer parent education classes that support ongoing curriculum programs. Especially trained Aboriginal and Islander Education Workers operate hand-in-hand with Aboriginal Health Workers to bring such programs to indigenous families. Although there is a downward trend in infant death rates over the last 10 years, the death rate for indigenous infants under 1 year old was still 3 times higher than that for other Australian infants.
This trend may be caused by the greatest current threat, to all families, in the more covert form of negative mental health practices. These include the decline in stable relationships, domestic violence and alcohol and drug abuse. Social commentator Hugh Mackay states that “most Australians believe that the health of our society depends on the health of families” (The Sunday Times 11/10/98). Parents from all racial backgrounds need to be helped to handle such life challenges whilst facing the ever changing demands of an external world. Any such assistance programs must acknowledge the inherent special family, cultural and spiritual contexts.
The recently published “Australia’s Children: their Health and Wellbeing 1998” notes that vehicle accidents, drowning and pedestrian accidents are the major causes of childhood injury deaths with boys having a higher death and hospitalisation rate than girls. This report also reports on risk factors such as those mentioned in the previous paragraph. To overcome the problems faced by Australian families, in this era of economic and social pressures, parenting education is the key.
Programs that offer all parents skills to address personal needs and that of their children will ensure that Australian children will grow up to fulfill their potential as healthy and happy citizens of tomorrow.
Last Modified: November 29, 2002