Context of Indigenous health Essay Example for Free

Context of autochthonous health EssayHistorical stage setting and social determinants of innate health There is a clear relationship between the social disadvantages experienced by original tidy sum and their current health status 1. These social disadvantages, directly re tardyd to dispossession and characterised by p all overty and powerlessness, are reflected in measures of education, employment, and income. Before presenting the key indicators of endemic health status, it is important, therefore, to provide a brief summary of the context within which these indicators should be considered.The historical context of innate health autochthonic nations generally enjoyed better health in 1788 than most(prenominal) people living in Europe 23456. They did non behave from smallpox, measles, influenza, tuberculosis, scarlet fever, venereal syphilis and gonorrhoea, diseases that were common in 18th coke Europe. native people probably suffered from hepatitis B, some bact erial infections (including a non-venereal form of syphilis and yaws) and some intestinal parasites.Trauma is likely to have been a major cause of death, and anaemia, arthritis, periodontal disease, and tooth attrition are known to have occurred. The impact of these diseases at a commonwealth level was relatively small compared with the effects of the diseases that affected 18th century Europe. All of this changed after 1788 with the arrival of introduced illness, initially smallpox and sexually transmissible infections (gonorrhoea and venereal syphilis), and later tuberculosis, influenza, measles, scarlet fever, and whooping cough 3478.These diseases, particularly smallpox, ca employ considerable loss of keep among Indigenous populations, only the impacts were not restricted to the immediate victims. The epidemic similarly affected the fabric of Indigenous societies through depopulation and social disruption. The impact of introduced diseases was almost surely the major cause of death for Indigenous people, but direct conflict and occupation of Indigenous homelands also contributed substantially to Indigenous mortality 7910.The initial responses of Indigenous people to the arrival of the First Fleet were apparently quite peaceful. It didnt take long, however, before conflict started to occur initially over access to fish stocks and wherefore over access to other resources as non-Indigenous people started to plant crops and introduce livestock. This pattern of conflict was almost certainly wide unfold as non-Indigenous people spread across the country. Conflict escalated in many places, in some instances resulting in overt massacres of Indigenous people.The 1838 massacre at Myall Creek (near Inverell, NSW) is the most infamous 11, but less well-known massacres occurred across Australia 10. As Bruce Elder notes, as painful and shameful as they are, the massacres should be as much a part of Australian history as the First Fleet, the explorers, the gold ru shes and the bushrangers (10, p. vi). Prior to 1788, Indigenous people were able to define their own sense of being through control over all aspects of their lives, including ceremonies, spiritual practices, medicine, social relationships, management of land, law, and economic activities 121314.In addition to the impacts of introduced diseases and conflict, the spread of non-Indigenous peoples undermined the ability of Indigenous people to lead healthy lives by devaluing their culture, destroying their traditionalistic food base, separating families, and dispossessing whole communities 347. This loss of autonomy undermined social vitality, which, in turn, affected the capacity to meet challenges, including health challenges a cycle of dispossession, demoralisation, and poor health was established.These impacts on Indigenous populations eventually forced compound authorities to try to protect remaining Indigenous peoples. This pressure led to the establishment of Aboriginal protecti on boards, the initial established in Vic by the Aboriginal Protection Act of 1869 15. A similar Act established the NSW Aborigines Protection Board in 1883, with the other colonies also enacting legislation to protect Indigenous populations within their boundaries. The protection provided under the provisions of the various Acts imposed enormous restrictions on the lives of many Indigenous people.These restrictions meant that, as late as 1961, in eastern Australia nearly one-third of all Australians recorded as being of Aboriginal descent lived in settlements (16, p. 4). The provisions of the Acts were also used to justify the forced separation of Indigenous children from their families by compulsion, duress or undue influence (15, p. 2). The National doubt into the separation of the children concluded that between one-in-three and one-in-ten Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families and communities in the period from approximately 1910 until 1970 (15, p. 31). It was the 1960s, at the earliest, when the various protection Acts were either repealed or became inoperative. The importance of modern-day social determinants and cultural concepts of Indigenous health The health disadvantages experienced by Indigenous people can be considered historical in origin 14, but perpetuation of the disadvantages owes much to contemporary structural and social factors, embodied in what have been termed the social determinants of health 11718.In broad terms, economic opportunity, physical infrastructure, and social conditions influence the health of individuals, communities, and societies as a whole. These factors are specifically manifest in measures such as education, employment, income, housing, access to operate, social networks, connection with land, racism, and incarceration. On all these measures, Indigenous people suffer substantial disadvantage. For many Indigenous people, the ongoing effects of protection and the forced separation of children f rom their families compound other social disadvantages.It is also important in considering Indigenous health to understand how Indigenous people themselves conceptualise health. There was no separate term in Indigenous languages for health as it is understood in western society 19. The traditional Indigenous perspective of health is holistic. It encompasses everything important in a persons life, including land, environment, physical body, society, relationships, and law. Health is the social, emotional, and cultural wellbeing of the whole community and the concept is therefore linked to the sense of being Indigenous.This conceptualisation of health has much in common with the social determinants model and has crucial implications for the simple natural covering of biomedically-derived concepts as a means of improving Indigenous health. The reductionist, biomedical approach is undoubtedly useful in identifying and reducing disease in individuals, but its limitations in addressing population-wide health disadvantages, such as those experienced by Indigenous people, must be recognised. Indicators of Indigenous social disadvantage.The key measures in these areas for Indigenous people subject arealy include Education consort to 2011 Australian Census 20 92% of 5 year-old Indigenous children were attending an educational institution 1. 6% of the Indigenous population had not attended school compared with 0. 9% of the non-Indigenous population 29% of Indigenous people reported year 10 as their highest year of school completion 25% had completed year 12, compared with 52% of non-Indigenous people 26% of Indigenous people reported having a post-school qualification, compared with 49% of non-Indigenous people 4.6% of Indigenous people had win a bachelor degree or higher, compared with 20% of non-Indigenous people. An ABS school report 21 revealed, in 2011 the apparent retention rate for Indigenous students from year 7/8 to year 10 was 99%, from year 7/8 to year 1 2 it was 49% for non-Indigenous students, the apparent retention rate from year 7/8 to year 10 was 101% and from year 7/8 to year 12 it was 81%.The 2011 national report on schooling in Australia 22 showed 76% of Indigenous students in year 3 and 66% in year 5 were at or to a higher place the national minimum standard for reading, compared with 95% and 93% respectively of all Australian students 80% of year 3 Indigenous students and 69% of year 5 Indigenous students were at or above the national minimum standard for persuasive writing, compared with 96% of all year 3 students and 94% of all year 5 students 72% of year 3 Indigenous students and 69% of year 5.Indigenous students were at or above the national minimum standard for spelling, compared with 94% of all year 3 students and 93% of all year 5 students 71% of year 3 Indigenous students and 65% of year 5 Indigenous students were at or above the national minimum standard for grammar and punctuation, compared with 94% of all year 3 students and 94% of all year 5 students 84% of Indigenous students in year 3 and 75% in year 5 were at or above the national minimum standard for numeracy, compared with 96% and 96% respectively of all Australian students.Employment concord to the 2011 Australian Census 20 42% of Indigenous people aged 15 years or older were assiduous and 17% were unemployed. In comparison, 61% of non-Indigenous people aged 15 years or older were employed and 5% were unemployed the most common occupation classification of employed Indigenous people was labourer (18%) followed by community and personal service workers (17%). The most common occupation classification of employed non-Indigenous people was professional (22%).Income According to the 2011 Australian Census 20 the mean equivalised gross household income for Indigenous persons was around $475 per week approximately 59% of that for non-Indigenous persons (around $800). Indigenous population found on education collected as a part of th e 2011 Census of Population and Housing, the ABS has estimated the Aboriginal and Torres narrow Islander population at 669,736 people at 30 June 2011 23. The estimated population for NSW was the highest (208,364 Indigenous people), followed by Qld (188,892), WA (88,277), and the NT (68,901) (Table 1). The NT has the highest proportion of Indigenous people among its population (29. 8%) and Vic the lowest (0. 9%).Table 1 Estimated Indigenous population, by jurisdiction, Australia, 30 June 2011 JurisdictionIndigenous population (number)Proportion of Australian Indigenous population (%)Proportion of jurisdiction population (%) Source ABS, 2012 23 Notes Preliminary estimates are subject to revision population projections are expected to be finalised by 2014 Australian population includes Jervis Bay Territory, the Cocos (Keeling).Islands, and Christmas Island Proportions of jurisdiction population have used total population figures estimated from demographic information for June 2011 NSW 208,36431. 12. 9 Vic47,3277. 10. 9 Qld188,89228. 24. 2 WA88,27713. 23. 8 SA37,3925. 62. 3 Tas24,1553. 64. 7 ACT6,1670. 91. 7 NT68,90110. 329. 8.Australia669,736100. 03. 0 There was a 21% increase in the number of Indigenous people counted in the 2011 Census compared with the 2006 Census2 24. The largest increases were in the ACT (34%), Vic (26%), NSW (25%) and Qld (22%). For all jurisdictions, the 55 years and over age-group showed the largest relative increase. There are two structural reasons contributing to the growth of the Indigenous population the slightly higher fertility rates of Indigenous women compared with the rates of other Australian women (see Births and pregnancy outcome) and the significant numbers of Indigenous babies born to Indigenous fathers and non-Indigenous mothers.Two other factors are considered likely to have contributed to the increase in people identifying as Indigenous changes in enumeration processes (i. e. more Indigenous people are being captured dur ing the census process) and changes in identification (i. e. people who did not previously identify as Indigenous in the census have changed their response). Based on the 2011 Census, around 33% of Indigenous people lived in a capital city 25. Detailed information about the geographic distribution of the Indigenous population for 2011 is not yet available, but figures from the 2006 Census indicated that the majority of Indigenous people lived in cities and towns 26.Slightly more than one-half of the Indigenous population lived in areas separate as major cities or inner regional areas, compared with almost nine-tenths of the non-Indigenous population. (As well as these two classifications of remoteness in terms of access to goods and services and opportunities for social interaction, the Australian Standard Geographical Classification (ASGC) has four other categories outer regional, remote, very remote, and migratory 27. ) Almost one-quarter of Indigenous people lived in areas class ified as remote or very remote in relation to having very little access to goods, services and opportunities for social interaction (28, p. 3). Less than 2% of non-Indigenous people lived in remote or very remote areas 26.In terms of specific geographical areas, more than one-half (53%) of all Indigenous people counted in the 2011 Census lived in nine of the 57 Indigenous regions (based largely on the former Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) regions) 25. The three largest regions were in eastern Australia (Brisbane, NSW Central and the North Coast, and Sydney-Wollongong), which accounted for 29% of the total Indigenous population.According to the 2011 Census, around 90% of Indigenous people are Aboriginal, 6% are Torres Strait Islanders, and 4% people identified as being of both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent 25. Around 63% of Torres Strait Islander people3 lived in Qld NSW was the only other state with a large number of Torres Strait Islander p eople. The Indigenous population is much younger overall than the non-Indigenous population (Figure 1) 23.According to estimates from the 2011 Census, at June 2011 about 36% Indigenous people were aged less than 15 years, compared with 18% of non-Indigenous people. About 3. 4% of Indigenous people were aged 65 years or over, compared with 14% of non-Indigenous people.Figure 1. Population pyramid of Indigenous and non-Indigenous populations, 30 June 2011 Population pyramid of indigenous and non-indigenous populations, 2011 Source ABS, 2012 23 References Carson B, Dunbar T, Chenhall RD, Bailie R, eds. (2007) Social determinants of Indigenous health. Crows Nest, NSW Allen and Unwin capital of Mississippi LR, Ward JE (1999) Aboriginal health why is reconciliation necessary?. 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