Health Plans Saving Infants

Infant Mortality In today's day and age with the massive amount of resources to humanity, it is a wonder as to why infant mortality is still a problem. The impact of the healthcare system has made improvements in this area, but there are still issues that lack clarity. The purpose of this essay is to demonstrate the need for free basic health insurance for new born babies to prevent illness and suffering. This essay will first summarize the problem before offering solutions on how best to address the problem.

The Centers for Disease Conrol (CDC) defined infant mortality as "the death of an infant before his or her first birthday." In this first year of life, the child is especially vulnerable to the threats of his or her environment and the risk of an infant dying is especially strong. Through medical and social evolution, infant mortality has generally gone down throughout time, but there are still efforts that need to be made. There is an infant mortality problem evident within our society today. According to Matthews et al.

(2013), " the U.S. infant mortality rate was 6.14 infants per 1000 live births in 2010, 4% lower than the rate of 6.39 in 2009. The number of infant deaths was 24,572 in 2010." The results of this study suggested that infants are dying at a lowered but still significant pace, and it is wise to assume that many infant mortality deaths are underreported. Infant mortality is a complex issue that does not provide easy solutions.

Since the infant's well being depends so much on the parents of that child, health care approaches are limited in their effects of influencing such problems. Chapman (2009) agreed with this when he wrote "like life expectancy, infant mortality is a function of many factors.

The more you look at the problem, the less it seems to be correctable by a big new federal role in medical insurance -- and, in fact, the less it seems to be mainly a medical issue at all." The impact of our culture suggests that individual behavior may behind many of these deaths. Obese and unhealthy mothers routinely put their children at risk due to their poor concepts of health and health care. The issue becomes mostly a battle of wills and not application of new health care instruments.

There are many factors that may contribute to the well being of an infant and these need to be explored in order to understand the problem in a holistic fashion. Infants depend on both the environmental factors and the family factors that contribute to the health and welfare of that child. Low birth weight and premature births are the main factors in predicting infant deaths and these factors can be addressed by not involving the medical health care system.

Technology has allowed for very small and premature infants to stay alive longer and has slightly remedied the problem to this point, however the numbers of infant deaths are still very significant in the larger scheme of society. The problem of infant mortality has many different political and social aspects that need to be understood by the medical industry in order to provide the best and most appropriate treatment. Solutions and Interventions The nature of this problem suggests that no panacea exists that can address this wholesale.

The more local infant mortality is addressed the more success any intervention may be. The causes of the problem need to be addressed first. Since society and environment play such a large role in how this problem develops, local regions and environments must address this problem at their level. There has been great success in using this approach. Dizikes (2014) documented how health care plans can be used in concert with right poltical and social tools.

This example of success took place in Thailand and he wrote "The researchers found that Thailand's "30 Baht" program, which increased access to hospitals, led to a 13% drop in infant mortality in about a year.

That change seems largely attributable to fewer infant deaths in rural areas, where previously the poor might never have entered hospitals to seek care." Thailand is not the United States however, and access to health care may be what is needed, but the social issues that surround the causes of infant mortality and low birth weight are unique to our society. Health care access is available, but it must be high quality and look after the best interests of both infant and the family.

The approach to administering health care must be evaluated and not simply just apply the more is better technique. Services are usually offered in very rural and poor communities, but services alone do not prevent infant deaths. The solution involves getting those who need the health care involved in their own treatment. The medical community and society as a whole, largely fail in promoting preventative health programs. Rather, surgeries and quick fix prescriptions substitute the necessity of changing behavior patterns that lead to the negative health consequences.

The answer to this problem is partly political and requires the use of existing energy to be directed in more useful ways. The pro-life political movement is very strong in many areas of the country where infant mortality is more problematic. Pro-life attitudes should be extended beyond just the moment of birth. The energy and money that is spent urging for the protection of the fetus should extend into infancy as well.

This approach requires a strong political force to instill this new ideal, and would require much time to see.