GLOBAL ISSUES

TOBACCO
Tobacco is the single greatest preventable cause
of illness and premature death in the U.S. Tobacco
use is now called "Tobacco dependence disease."
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC) says that smokers who try to quit are more
successful when they have the support of their
physician.

HIV/AIDS
Between 11 and 15% of U.S. AIDS cases occur in
seniors over age 50. Between 1991 and 1996, AIDS
in adults over 50 rose more than twice as fast as in
younger adults. Seniors are unlikely to use condoms,
have immune systems that naturally weaken with
age, and HIV symptoms (fatigue, weight loss,
dementia, skin rashes, swollen lymph nodes) are
similar to symptoms that can accompany old age.
Again, stereotypes about aging in terms of sexual
activity and drug use keep this problem largely
unrecognized. That's why seniors are not well
represented in research, clinical drug trials,
prevention prograMental Health

MENTAL HEALTH
Dementia is not part of aging. Dementia can be caused by
disease, reactions to medications, vision and hearing
problems, infections, nutritional imbalances, diabetes, and
renal failure. There are many forms of dementia (including
Alzheimer's Disease) and some can be temporary. With
accurate diagnosis comes management and help. The
most common late-in-life mental health
condition is depression. If left untreatedfact: The
rate of suicide is higher for elderly white men
than for any other age group, including
adolescents.ms and efforts at intervention.
depression in the elderly can lead to suicide.

Overweight and Obesity

Being overweight or obese increases your chances of
dying from hypertension, type 2 diabetes, coronary
heart disease, stroke, gallbladder disease,
osteoarthritis, sleep apnea, respiratory problems,
dyslipidemia and endometrial, breast, prostate, and
colon cancers. In-depth guides and practical advice
about obesity are available from the National Heart
Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of
Health

Injury and Violence

Among seniors, falls are the leading cause of
injuries, hospital admissions for trauma, and
deaths due to injury. One in every three seniors
(age 65 and older) will fall each year.
Strategies to reduce injury include exercises to
improve balance and strength and medication
review. Home modifications can help reduce
injury. Home security is needed to prevent
intrusion. Home-based fire prevention devices
should be in place and easy to use. People aged
65 and older are twice as likely to die in a home fire as
the general population.

Environmental Quality

Even

though pollution affects all of us,

government studies have indicated that
low-income, racial and ethnic minorities
are more likely to live in areas where they
face environmental risks. Compared to the
general population, a higher proportion of
elderly are living just over the poverty
threshold.

Access to Health
Seniors frequently don't monitor their health as seriously as they should.
While a shortage of geriatricians has been noted nationwide, URMC has one
of the largest groups of geriatricians and geriatric specialists of any medical

community in the country. Your access to health care is as close as URMC,

offering a menu of services at several
hospital settings, including the VA Hospital
in Canandaigua.

CONCERNS

SARS, meet the hajj.

Quite recently, weve had the emergence of another virus: MERS, the Middle
East Respiratory Syndrome, coming out of Saudi Arabia, Garrett said. Were
all very, very nervous about it, because the hajj is coming up next week, and at
that time, there will be a few million people pouring into Saudi Arabia, and
part of the hajj is to walk aroundTo breathe on each other? offered
Kummer. Garrett laughed but only a little. This is a virus; it turns out,
probably to come from Egyptian tomb bats, which is very Bla Lugosi,
actually. It is very similar to the SARS virus which emerged in China in 2003
and had a very serious outbreak.

Viruses will be the new, lethal spam mail.

When 3-D printing becomes 4-D printing, Garrett argues, people will be able
to send self-replicating viruses across the world in seconds. Its now possible
to design your own genomic sequence and to send that sequence to a 3-D
printer that is loaded with nucleotides, she explained. Some drug companies
are already using the 3-D printer mode to transmit necessary information for
the production of antigens for vaccines, she said. Theres already a phrase in
Silicon Valley, '4-D printing,' that refers to creating structures that then selfform once they come out of the 3-D printer. I would argue that in biology, that
4-D printing is self-replication. From a national security standpoint, its

about information. I can send a sequence to somebodys printer thousands of

miles away, and that sequence is the key to creating a dangerous organism

Vaccines and the health workers who distribute them are being
demonized.
According to Garrett, after the CIA used a fake hepatitis vaccination campaign
as a front to try and get into Osama bin Ladens compound, militant Islamic
groups became suspicious of all kinds of vaccination campaigns.They have
used that as a way to justify a whole campaign that claims that polio
vaccinations have to be stopped, (a) because its some kind of CIA plot, and (b)
these guys are saying until you stop all the drone attacks, they will kill polio
vaccinators. These are unarmed, mostly female volunteers, all over Pakistan,
Somalia, Afghanistan, and theyre being targeted for assassinations, for
brutality, in the name of Islam, she said.
Scientists are producing new airborne viruses, apparently just for
the heck of it.
The bird flu virus that emerged in 1997 fortunately hasnt affected many
human beings yet, but it has a 66 percent mortality in humans when they do
get infected, so it is the single-most lethal virus we have seen in circulation in
human beings, Garrett said. What has happened is that a lot of virologists
are now, in the name of public health, [performing] experiments that give
circulating viruses a capacity that they dont have in nature to see what if? A
Dutch lab that was funded by the NIH turned H5N1 into a virus that spread
between ferrets through the air ferrets as a surrogate for humans. And just a
few months ago, a Chinese veterinary lab transformed 127 viruses [into] manmade flu, all H5N1. Five of those were transformed into airborne viruses, she
said. I dont think theres any evil here, but I think that theres a lot of bizarre,
misplaced scientific intent.
Watch out for the octogenarian invasion.
But those in the Western world need not look far for a more mundane but
pressing threat: the aging population. As people age, every society is getting
more cancer, more heart disease, more diabetes, more chronic health
problems. The worst part, Garrett says? We dont have an architecture of
global health that has a clue how to address these issues.

MAPEH
GRADE-10

PRESENT GLOBAL ISSUES

AND CONCERNS

SUBMITTED BY:
MAYBELLE LEGASPI
SARAH MAE MACAPANAS
NOVAJIN TALJA
MA.TINA RALUTO
LARABELLE SAGUN

JHON MICHAEL PENASO

SUBMITTED TO:
MAAM
AILEEN RAGANOT
MAPEH TEACHER