Essay on “Health Education” Complete Essay for Class 10, Class 12 and Graduation and other classes.

Health Education

Health Education means  making people aware of the various practices that must be followed to ensure healthy personal as well as community life. Health education has to create awareness in the community about the prevailing health problems. It should also help the community to discover resources available for solving those problems. For example, health education should  make one aware of the importance of balanced food for maintaining good health. Then it should help him to plan a balanced diet out of the food materials that are locally available. However, before planning a balanced diet one must have knowledge of the essential nutrients present in the different food items. All this information is imparted to the community through health education. Health education also makes one aware of the causes of various diseases, the ways through which through which they spread makes the people conscious of importance of good health and makes them realize that maintenance of good health is a problem requiring effort of all members of the community.

The simplest and most traditional definition of health is that health is the freedom from sickness and disease. According to World Health Organization (WHO), a branch of the United Nations, Health is physical, mental and social well being and not merely the absence of disease. next to life itself, health is our most precious gift. Good is health is necessary for a purposeful existence. A healthy individual is the one who has these characteristics – freedom of sickness and disease, freedom from unnecessary tension, freedom from social and psychological worries, self-confidence, ability to work efficiently with enthusiasm.  

Good health can be achieved only through our efforts and proper health education. We can maintain a good health only if we are aware of various factors which affect our health. For example, if we are aware of importance of balanced diet we would plan our food carefully. Similarly, if we are aware of how infections are spread through air, water, insects and other mechanisms, we would act accordingly so that we are protected from infections.

In order to impart basic health education to people, community health centres are set up with main functions such as to educate the people about common diseases; their causes, modes of their infection; methods of preventions, precautions and remedies, to ensure that food an d water they use is clean and proper to use.

Keeping in mind the large population of our country it would be unrealistic to expect that a doctor or a health worker would reach each and every person and educate him about various health problems. Such education can be spread only through the collective effort of more and more  people. More and more volunteers, both man and woman, should be trained and educated about the basic issues affecting health. They can further spread this knowledge in their own circles. This type of complete involvement of the people in health education helps in tackling various problems concerning health through personal as well as community initiative. If the people are aware of hazards of polluted water they will take remedial measures themselves. Through collective effort, they may force the owner of the industrial unit to stop such offending practice.