Health Awareness Is Rising In America

By simply typing “health” into the now ever convenient World Wide Web, one will instantly see news, advertising, and tons of medical information on various sites. One such site, known as WebMD, will even give you a basic diagnosis of your symptoms should you be feeling sick or general health tips such as how to avoid a cold. Fifty years ago health concerns weren’t a number one priority for people in America. In today’s world, we have commercials about the Butterton’s telling us we shouldn’t eat so much saturated fats and McDonald’s adding apples to their Happy Meals. What has changed? Why within the last fifty years has health become so important to America?

One of the largest, more prominent reasons health has become important to the American people is the widespread disease called cancer. It comes in many forms, some are even inherited, and as many people watch their family members die from it, they feel a growing fear that it could actually happen to them. October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and this year the founders celebrate twenty-five years of spreading information on symptoms, self-checks, and when to see your doctor about this disease that has taken so many loving and needed family members, co-workers, and friends from our mists. Though cancer is incurable it can be treated with radiation, chemo and sometimes surgery if discovered soon enough, but for a countless amount of women it’s often too late.

Majority of cancer survivors chose to devote the remainder of their lives to educating the population and encouraging others to get themselves checked routinely. Generally it seems those who care about it most are the ones who have had a personal experience with a family member hospitalized or pass on. Smokers that have witnessed an elder lifetime-smoking relative receive the news that they have lung cancer, as one fourth of the population does, may be influenced to put down the tobacco sticks themselves. Because the information is so easily available, the cancer survival rates in the last few years have been slowly declining as stated in the National Cancer Institute online.

Health awareness has changed the way in which Americans look at food, exercise habits, and socializing. Today we teach our children about calories, fats and the differences between fast food and food prepared at home. Families attempt to spend more time together outdoors playing physical games instead of staying inside with movies or videogames. Most importantly we talk with those we care about and extend our knowledge to continue lowering the number of disease- or cancer-related deaths. Being acquainted with the major illnesses in the world also brings people to help in whatever ways they can to repress their continuation. After all, awareness to the important health issues is what helps people discover that they have it and receive the proper care in time.