LIMITS AND ACCESS TO HEALTH CARE

People’s health is closely related to access to health care. Although most health policies seem to be written for people and their well-being, the reality appears to be different. In their May 2003 editorial on men’s health, Treadwell and Ro1 presented one of the biggest current public health problems: Too many people around the world suffer from lack of proper access to health care. Developing countries are usually described as bad examples of organization and access to health care, but what about the developed nations? They are also not doing well. Many painful examples show that the status of the individual—which was not supposed to be a factor, according to national and international policies—defines health status.

Treadwell and Ro indicate that the reality in men’s health is a miserable situation—people already discriminated against for their ethnicity, race, social and financial status, and age are later discriminated against in health provision. Is this equity? That those who experience poor conditions in their lives should also have to struggle with poor access to health care?

The May editorials on men’s health, together with the international findings presented in that issue, show that when health is the topic, there are no differences between different parts of the world. Access to health for underserved populations must be improved. The public health alarm raised in the May issue of the Journal must be responded to before inequalities in access to care turn into the biggest disaster of the future. Obviously, all public health and policy measures so far have contributed to this situation. We should think ahead to work toward better health access and the elimination of discrimination. Health is a given and is not dependent on race, ethnicity, ability to pay, or employment status. The provision of health care should follow this rule.