WHEN SHOULD YOU ADDRESS SOCIAL DETERMINANTS OF COMMUNITY HEALTH AND DEVELOPMENT?
ANSWER
It would help if you always looked at the social factors that play a role in community issues, but there are some times when analysis of those factors is particularly important.
- When it is clear that simply focusing on the issue is not enough, as cities have found, again and again, that all the enforcement in the world will not stop youth violence. There has to be a change in the culture that creates that violence.
- When you advocate for legislation, policy change, or funding to address a community issue, the legislation, policy, or funding – and therefore your advocacy – should address the underlying causes of the problem you are trying to solve, as well as its symptoms. Otherwise, you will be dealing with the symptoms forever.
- When you are trying to demonstrate that fundamental change is needed, change is difficult for everyone. Getting a community to change its attitudes and behaviour is even more difficult. Explaining how the changes are related to positive results can make things easier.
- When looking for long-term solutions to long-term problems, long-term solutions are only possible by taking into account the root causes of the problems you want to solve. Analyzing the social determinants of those problems makes it possible to address them and come to real, permanent solutions.
- When your focus is on community wellness and prevention, whether you are trying to guard against a disease or debilitating condition or create a healthy community, you have to look at the issue as a whole to be successful. You cannot lower your blood pressure, for instance, without adjusting your diet, exercise, stress levels, and daily activities, all of which may be governed, to some extent, by social and personal factors. You cannot alter racial tensions in a community without addressing all the history that led to those tensions, the preconceptions and misconceptions on both sides, personal experiences, the attitudes of community officials and police, the racial prejudice endemic in society, etc.
QUESTION
WHEN SHOULD YOU ADDRESS SOCIAL DETERMINANTS OF COMMUNITY HEALTH AND DEVELOPMENT?