Mudasir Ali
Awareness always plays an important role in our life and keeps us up to date in daily routines. It acts as a main pillar in procuring specific information of all kind of events and tragedies which are happening cross the globe. Health awareness can in no way be ignored and compromised but to streamline its service in a community or village to ensure better and equipped health programs designating for health issues and health education.
Health Sectors carry nation’s half burden on its shoulders by minimizing the death rates and increasing birth rates. Nations can run progressively in all walks when they have better health care infrastructure and adept medical professionals who are considered one of the main parts of the health system working tirelessly by giving their services in normal and bad days. To facilitate its efficient role for promoting healthier community with high life expectancy rate and surviving potential with the health awareness would be deemed one of the major preventive steps in the health sector. There is a division of labor in health sector from top to bottom.
For instance, a state has many big hospitals at headquarter level and in district levels come under particular jurisdictions both are undertaking the whole burden of health with utmost care and responsibilities. We have small health centers in communities like PHCs, Sub Centers and Dispensaries as well which are being run for the people. Local people visit to such centers to take prescriptions from the medical professionals while having any kind of illness. However, these centers are not in a position to take large amount of pressure to deal with the patients as it depends upon the facilities available but to some extent they are doing their best for giving services on a small scale in the communities.
The health Sector here has not taken any initiative yet for conducting health awareness programs at such centers. People in local community are not much aware of health diseases and their preventive measures. Health awareness in no way to be ignored but it should be given the top priority in health sector. Sometimes we see medical relief camps are held in our communities but they do not have any significant role in related to health aspects. Awareness encompasses almost all phases of keeping good health which is the most important aspect to know about various diseases and necessary precautions. This awareness may somehow alleviate the impact of a stressed community if awareness is to be provided properly at these centers by our medical experts and health educators.
The higher officials of our health sector should mull and take a new initiative for conducting health awareness programs in the future time for making common people aware of infectious diseases like HIV, HEPATITIS-B, TB, and asthma and non-infectious as well. We see the horrifying situation in the world that has caused by covid-19 due to relentlessly spreading in almost all countries creating much chaos and fear among the people. It would be far effective and worthwhile to conduct health awareness programs in communities so that everyone should get familiar with the symptoms and preventive measures of both acute and chronic diseases. The people living in rural areas are not much aware of health diseases and precautions. They need to be educated well before any disease takes a vicious cycle further involving them into many ailments. To ensure proper mechanism of awareness and health education among the people can have a great impact in protecting their lives.
To conduct Health Programs in the villages would be proved beneficial to make people more aware to get some basic knowledge for health related issues. This is the time that the health sector should apply pragmatic approach rather than to have a well written health prescriptions for the patients in hospitals. By and large we all are witnessed in rural areas that our health centers lack in basic health requirements.
Health awareness programs are need of the hour at community level. It would likely to have more influence wherein people can participate locally to know about diseases and their remedial measures. Health administration must take some key steps in organizing awareness programs in order to strengthening its best role at community level.
It is often saying prevention is better than cure but awareness is a tool whereby it would direct us from preventing diseases. It would be a wonderful work if state’s health sector move one step forward to draw a holistic sketch for the *Community Health Awareness Programs*. Nowadays We often come to see in hospitals, patients in long queues with pale faces waiting for hours under the blistering sun all day to get a turn for medical consultations. Majority of the health issues will be sorted out with ease by lessening some burden on the districts health centers.
The Author is M.Sc from Kashmir University and can be reached at ahangermudasir92@gmail.com
