What If We Treated Gun Violence Like A Public Health Crisis?

Just like on the midterm, the way this final works is that I have provided you 5 questions, one per week’s topic. You need to answer the questions to the best of your ability. I will randomly be selecting 2 questions to grade, and then you will have the choice of which 3rd question you want me to review. After everyone has submitted their final exams (on Wednesday morning 8AM of Finals Week), you will be allowed to go into Moodle and select the question number you want me to grade.

Responses will be graded based on 3 things .

1) How thoroughly and thoughtfully you explained the answer.

2) How feasible and creative your response was in terms of solutions, or options for solving problems. 3) How cleanly written it is. Please no typos and no grammatical mistakes.

You must provide links for all of your sources if you reference anything besides your textbook. You all know what reliable sources are, so make sure anything you are referencing is from a reliable, credible source.

*Hint: Each response should probably be at least ½ a page if you are answering thoroughly. Less than ½ a page means you probably didn’t provide enough detail.

Week 6 question

Do people choose their own health, particularly their own nutrition and physical activity? Whether you think the answer is yes, no, or somewhere in between, make a case for your answer. Build your case referencing at least 4 different factors that influence health from Chapters 13,14, and 16. Be specific and think about psychosocial factors and policies, systems, and environmental factors that are relevant to your response.

Week 7 question

Where does the U.S. rank in terms for infant and maternal mortality? Thinking about these rankings, explain the quote “maternal child health is not a health problem, it is a social problem with health consequences.” What are some of the social and economic factors that influence women and children’s ability to be healthy? What are some things that can be done to improve the health of women and children? What we can learn from tobacco prevention efforts to improve maternal and child health? What specific strategies could we use from tobacco? Or, are there things we could learn from other countries?

Week 8 question

Explain, in your own words, what the 3 levels of prevention are. Pick a specific mental health or injury area and discuss how we could intervene at each of the three levels of prevention to improve health outcomes. How would the strategies need to be different for each of the different levels of prevention? What is at least 1 thing that you think we can do to reduce stigma surrounding mental health or surrounding seeking help for mental health issues?

Week 9 question

In your own words, explain the differences and the relationship between medical care and public health. Why are the two sometimes in conflict with each other? How could we change our current system (either the medical care system or the public health system) to improve health outcomes for everyone in our society (Please provide at least 2 specific examples of changes we could make)? Are there any potential unintended consequences of making these changes?

Week 10 question

Which is the fastest growing age group in U.S. society? What are the potential effects as this big group of people ages? What are some of the challenges we will be facing with the younger generations not being as healthy at an earlier age? Can our focus simply be on trying to help people live longer, or do we also need to be focusing on improving quality of life? What are some specific strategies we can implement to help people age healthily? How can we strengthen public health efforts in the future to support older people and society as a whole?

Extra credit:

Please pick one of the news stories below and answer the following questions about it.

1. How/why is this topic a public health issue?

2. Who is most affected by the issue?

3. What are the larger societal implications of the issue, and what happens if things don’t change?

4. What do you think are some of the upstream prevention strategies that we could be implementing to address this problem?

5. What do you think are some of the policy, systems, or environmental changes that could be made to address the problem?

Story 1: The Opioid Crisis is Surging in Black, Urban Communities

Story 2: What If We Treated Gun Violence Like A Public Health Crisis?

Story 3: Increased Hours Online Correlate With An Uptick In Teen Depression, Suicidal Thoughts

Story 4: Scientists Start To Tease Out The Subtler Ways Racism Hurts Health

Story 5: Is There a Ticking Time Bomb Under the Arctic?