By: Prapanna Lahiri

Health and wellness are related words and are often used alongside and sometimes interchangeably with each other. Although a person cannot have one and not the other, they are two different concepts having significantly different meanings. The simple difference between health and wellness, precisely stated, is that health is a state of being, whereas wellness is the practice of living a healthy lifestyle. While health refers to physical, mental, and social well-being; wellness aims at enhancing well-being. World Health Organization (WHO) defines Health as the “state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease, or infirmity (illness).” They define Wellness as “an active process through which people become aware of and make choices towards a healthy and fulfilling existence.” The point of difference between the two lies in wellness being always a matter of choice. If health is the goal, wellness is the active process of achieving it.

WHO’s definition of health has often been criticized for being excessively inclusive and unattainable, especially, as it makes use of the word “complete,” but factually the paraphrase goes on to broaden the medical definition of health beyond the simple absence of disease. The emphasis being on physical, mental and social wellbeing, good health does depend on improvements in economic, social and physical environment that includes the system of healthcare. Further, improvements in environment can only be ensured by conscious efforts at making intelligent lifestyle choices, which again by definition is wellness.   

Risk factors affecting health:

Since health is a state of wellbeing, free from disease, illness and injury, it is dependent on sundry risk factors which are actions or conditions that increase a person’s risk of illness or injury. Some of the risk factors that can impede good health are as follows: ―

Smoking: It is a major risk factor for cardiovascular diseases and lung cancer.

Drinking alcohol: It can lead to liver damage, stroke, heart ailments and also cancer.

Sedentary lifestyle: It enhances all causes of mortality, doubles the risk of cardiovascular diseases, obesity, diabetes, hypertension, lipid disorders, colon cancer and mental ailments like depression and anxiety.

Unprotected sex: It risks spread of certain STDs (sexually transmitted diseases) that include the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) causing AIDS (Acquired immunodeficiency Syndrome), an incurable condition that interferes with the body’s ability to fight infections.

Tough physical activities/ sports: These activities may result in broken bones and other types of bodily injuries. 

Remedies:

Having recourse to reactive and proactive actions to remedy the health risk factors lie in measures of wellbeing. The reactive response is seen in the patient with poor health engaging the medical fraternity to treat illnesses. The proactive response lies in measures of prevention of illnesses to maximise vitality. Adopting lifestyles that promote improved health, prevent disease and enhance quality of life is a choice that lends a sense of wellbeing which is multidimensional having physical, intellectual, emotional, environmental, social and spiritual facets of life. This choice is driven by self-responsibility for a healthy living.

Reference:    

• https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4535518/
• https://www.medicinenet.com/what_is_health_and_wellness/article.htm
• https://www.who.int/news/item/04-04-2002-physical-inactivity-a-leading-cause-of-disease-and-disability-warns-who

By: Dr. Anamitra Roy

Violence is defined as disruptive or destructive behavior. The aim behind violence is to pose a threat or cause harm to someone. Previously, there were opinions about violence being regional. However, in today’s times the popular opinion is that violence is a global phenomenon.  According to statistics, it results in the loss of 1.6 million lives each year. And these numbers do not accrue from one particular country or region of the Earth. Thus, it can be said that violence is one of the leading reasons around the world for the creation of problems in the human civilization.

There have been efforts to study violence prone zones in the world. It has been seen that middle to lower income countries are usually more violence prone. Thus, many economists have linked violence to Economics. This is a modern concept that violence is just not linked to Behavioral Science.

Psychologists say that some people have difficulty in controlling their emotions. This makes them react to something violently. Now, the question arises that why is it that some people have difficulty in controlling their emotions. There are many social, economic and political reasons behind this. Just biological reasons do not give birth to violence always. Thus, if it has to be pointed out that why violence is there, then it has to be said that violence is here because of social, political and economic reasons.

Violence is such a relevant topic in today’s world because it can be linked to Physical Sciences and Social Sciences.

According to Rivara et al (2019) violence in its many forms can affect the health of people who are the targets, those who are the perpetrators and the communities in which both live. The biological effects of violence have become increasingly better understood and include effects on the brain, neuroendocrine system and immune response. The physical injuries that stem from violence have been studied extensively in this era. But more important in this context, are the mental injuries i.e., the injuries that are caused to the mind.

The scope of the problem of violence demands that attention be paid to primary prevention and not just treatment of the victims with secondary and tertiary prevention programs.

Across all countries, conflict, homicide, terrorism, genocide and other types of violence hinder human productivity and economic development. Apart from its human impact, violence imposes substantial economic costs on individuals, communities and nations.

Thus, the impact of violence has to be studied not only from a biological viewpoint. This also has to be studied from the economic standpoint.

Whenever and wherever, there is violence, there are losses incurred. There is one way to avoid this. The person who gets affected needs to fight against the people who are responsible for the violence. But a question arises in this context. Is it possible for every person to fight? The simple answer is a ‘no’. It is never possible for every person to fight. In the modern era, fighting requires physical strength. More importantly, it requires powers of different sorts. It requires money power, media power, political power and public relations power. Not every person in the world will be having these types of powers. Thus, ensuring safety is one of the most debatable and discussed topics in the modern era.

Ensuring safety is one of the toughest tasks that one can take up at this point of time. While discussing about how to ensure safety, not for one single moment, can we forget that this is the age of globalization. In this age, the whole world is one. There is not much scope for regionalism. Therefore, the violence that has been talked about here may arise from any source, from any part of the world. Thus, safety in this era does not encompass safety around us against the local sources of violence. To a huge extent, this word ‘safety’ also incorporates safety against digital violence.

It is believed by many in this generation that ensuring safety actually means ensuring education. It is only through education that we will be able to determine the sources of violence and then safeguard ourselves against them.

In the modern era that we are all living in, it is to a huge extent true that we need to ensure safety against the various sources of violence. But, at the same time it is also true that one individual has limited powers when it comes to ensuring safety. Thus, every human being in every nook and corner of this planet has to depend on the government or governmental bodies to ensure safety. The government has to exercise different methods in different types of nations to ensure safety. In a developing nation, one of the main reasons of violence is ‘roti, kapda aur makann’. Thus, in such nation’s safety means ‘biological safety’. On the contrary, in developed nations, safety means social, cultural and political safety mostly.

In conclusion, it can be pointed out that safety against violence is a matter of concern for all. Therefore, to ensure its presence in our lives, it is the duty of all to contribute towards it.