Health around the world
In Australia we would generally consider ourselves to be healthy and we have access to good doctors, hospitals and
healthcare. Some of us may take this for granted and realize that not all of the people in the world enjoy access to good
health care. Today we will take a closer look at people’s health around the world.
1. Life expectancy, (the age people will live to) and access to Physicians (Doctors, GP’s, Physio’s) are an excellent
measure of a country’s health.
(i) Using the World Statistics tables at the back of your atlas, find the life expectancy and Physicians per 1000
people for the following countries in the table. Then rank them from highest to lowest.
Country Male Female Average Rank Physicians Rank
Argentina 72 80 76.95 6 301 4 7511
Australia 78 83 119.5 1 250 5 22074
Bolivia 63 68 65.5 10 73 8 1036
Haiti 52 54 53 11 25 11 437
Iceland 78 82 80 4 347 2 32449
Japan 78 85 81.5 2 201 7 39195
Malawi 42 41 41.5 12 1 13 165
New Zealand 76 82 72 8 222 6 14984
Sweden 78 83 80.5 3 305 3 28912
Thailand 70 74 72 8 30 10 2399
United States 75 81 78 7 549 1 36789
Vietnam 68 74 71 9 54 9 501
Zambia 39 40 39.5 13 7 12 572
Answer the following questions in your journal. Explain your answers in full sentences.
(ii) Does your table show a link between life expectancy and access to physicians? Explain
Yes, because the more medicine and doctors means longer life expectancy.
(iii) Give 3 reasons why you think the countries ranked higher in life expectancy live longer than the lower
ranked countries?
1. More doctors
2. Better medicine supplies
3. More wealth
(iv) Fill in the last column of the table with each country’s GDP (a measure of the country’s wealth).
(v) Is there a correlation between the wealth of the country and life expectancy and access to doctors?
The more poor countries have less doctors and shorter life expectancy.
2. Look at the map of access to ‘Safe water’ on page 250
(i) How would you describe Australia, Europe and Japan’s access to safe water?
They have generally good water access
(ii) Which continent has the worst access to safe water?
(iii) For people living in the continent in (ii), what impact do you think this could have on their health?
It would/could
3. Looking at the figure on calorie intake, (on projector) what do you think it means that Australia has an intake of
128% while Ethiopia has a daily intake of 73%?
Possible you tube clips for world health
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swpO979AuC8&feature=related poverty in world, pics to music
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i22DvoyuCOc&feature=related poor vs rich, don’t complain
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEnlrE4iMBU charity water central Africa
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXR4Z_NBD-E&feature=related UNICEF water day