Canada is Public Health; Jonathan Low

EDUCATION IS PREVENTION

Talking to my local Public health official was such a cool experience! Going to school at BYU, we often get the Public Health take on what is happening in Utah County so getting the ‘skinny’ of what is happening in my hometown and province was so incredibly interesting to me. The conversation I had with Jessica Koegler (R.N) who is a Public Health Nurse for my community made me want to drop everything and go home to help in increasing awareness of all the public health issues.

            STD’S!

When I asked Jessica what the top trend or issue was the first thing out of her mouth was STD’s. This shocked and horrified me! I could not believe that my city of 90,000 people would have such a problem with this.  She said the two most prevalent STD’s are syphilis and chlamydia and that young teenagers and college students have the highest incidence rate, another shocker! I asked her why this might be and she rebutted very simply that it was the lack of education combined with the stigma of having an ‘STD.’ While my mind was still trying to wrap around the fact that MY city was infected with syphilis and chlamydia and that they were the top public health concern Jessica continued to go on about the government’s Sexual Health Clinic that is underused and underfunded.  There are programs for those infected but the prevention efforts are minimal. I was and still am horrified.

            Aboriginal Health

After extensively covering the topic of STD’s Jessica said that the next issue was aboriginal health.  The city I live in is 40 minutes away from an Indian reserve thus aboriginal health is of major concern to public health officials.  Though not true with all the Indians on the reserve, many find themselves relying on the government for funds and end up forfeiting knowledge of how to work and how to manage money and consequently fall into addictions like smoking and drinking.  This is a concern because the children of the adults who fall into this then grow up with these influences and then continue in the footsteps of their parents.  Statistics show that the aboriginals have a 35% teen pregnancy rate, die at a much younger age (and normally from liver or kidney failure), and aren’t about to change despite government efforts.

            Immunization Negligence

The third trend we discussed was the lack of immunization.  The southern part of the province that I live in is very heavily populated with members of the LDS faith and from what Jessica said, there are multiple groups or ‘colonies’ of ladies who band together and pact to not immunize their children with the excuse that the disease ‘does not exist anymore.’ This is a pride issue and a lack of education on how diseases spread and in turn leads to the fourth trend that is whooping cough.

            Whooping Cough

A few months back there was a large whooping cough outbreak in my area due to the lack of immunization. There is a certain group of people called Dutch Reforms who live in Southern Alberta and who do not immunize their children consequently this lead to an outbreak of whooping cough around the area but also in the large hospital that serviced Southern Alberta.  Once people heard that the hospital had whooping cough many decided to stay home and avoid being treated in an effort to not get a worse strain of the virus which in turn lead to a few deaths (mostly among premature babies).

            Food Scarcity and Obesity

The last trend that Jessica and I discussed was one that had never even crossed my mind and that was food scarcity or poverty and how it affects the general health of the community as well as obesity rates.  Apparently these are normal families that have normal sized homes and two or three cars but are too busy trying to keep track of material things that they do not save money for food and find themselves living off of food stamps and unhealthy, cheap foods.

            Overall Jessica said that the biggest thing is a lack of education in all of these fields and that more health classes should be offered.  I really enjoyed my conversation with her and find that it really did make me more aware of what my city was facing and more aware of things I can do to help. That is public health!