Health and the media / by Jack Ling

Health and the media Without wholehearted backing from the media in convey- ing health messages to the greate'st number of people, we risk having only Health for Some instead of Health for All Within the broad spectrum of development, two sectors have stood out as among the fastest growing in the 1960s and 1970s. The media sector's growth has been phenomenal and is plain for all to see. Most countries have busily expanded and improved their physical infrastructure in the media sector, launching newspapers and magazines, establishing printing plants , setting up radio and television stations . In many least-developed countries-where lit- eracy is low and roads are few-radio is virtually the only nationwide system for delivering information. At the same time, the health sector has been expanding at a rapid pace . 18 by Jack Ling No government can ignore the health needs of its people , and most health ministries-though they may not rate high in the political hierarchy-have expanded their health and medical services in recent decades. Today the health sector recognises that there are limits to technological and medical interventions. Health is a social phenomenon , and better health for a nation can only come about with active support from many sectors. Health behaviour itself has many de- terminants, whether cultural, social, economic, environmental or " infor- mational ", in addition to biological and medical. Moreover, health must begin with the individual and the corn- m unity . So if health actions are to have a lasting impact , they must involve a public which has been adequately informed. The medical and health professions and the media do not make easy bedfellows. Doctors and scientists tend to regard journalists with deep suspicion, and the time-honoured tradition that "doctors don't adver- tise" may have influenced the attitude of many physicians in public health servtces. Media people in turn have little patience with highly technical medical material. The guarded formulae and technological jargon of medical publi- cations bore them ; they are inclined to want simple answers to straight ques- tions so that they can get a news-story to retail to the public. Today these two sides have reached a juncture where they must achieve mutual dependence. Without the in- volvement of the media , the health sector cannot hope to inform the general public on health issues or to stimulate a process of community involvement. Without the technical input of the health sector , the media cannot fulfil their obligation to serve the interests of the public-and these public interests certainly include health. Only in 1982, during the World Health Assembly held in Geneva, the Assembly President and Malaysia's Minister of Health, Dr Tan Sri Chong, Where literacy is low, radio may be the only nationwide system for delivering health information. Photo W HO/Za far W oRLD HEALTH, March 1986 A boy keeps abreast of the news in an Indonesian bird market. Newspapers too are a key source of positive health information. Photo WHO/C. Stauffer said: "Lifestyles are no longer con- ditioned by climate and culture. They are initiated as fast as communications speed information·from one country to another. " He was referring to those illnesses that have their principal roots in life patterns : cancer , heart diseases, alcohol and drug abuse, stress, and various environmentally caused and psycho-social illnesses. In effect , he had defined a new type of communicable disease: in addition to bacterial or viral or vector-borne dis- eases, we now have illnesses that are " communicated " by Images and information . So the power of the media includes the power to do harm to health. But when the media and health sectors work together, and work together in a systematic way, then that power can become a power for good. The media will need to become more aware of their own role in raising W oRLD HEALTH, March 1986 awareness , stimulating public discus- sion , articulating public needs in the fields of health and social develop- ment. And in turn, the health sector will need to recognise what media can do, not merely in serving as a platform for news-stories (since hard news ac- counts for only a small part of the media's content) but in employing en- tertainment as a means for conveying health messages and influencing social behaviour. Health messages can be very effective when they are presented as part of " life" in entertainment programmes. The health sector should focus on making technical subjects digestible and understandable to the layman. In particular the health professionals should identify existing, credible chan- nels of communication, including trad- itional ones , in order to reach the public. The media offer the public health community more than just ac- cess to air-time and newspaper space; they are also a source of that com- munications expertise that is needed to ensure the success of large-scale health promotion campaigns and to transmit technical information about health to a mass audience. What is more, useful follow-up to media-transmitted messages can be effected by village health workers. For instance, primary health care workers can be an effective mass channel of communication by delivering in per- son the same messages that have been delivered to a target audience in print or over the radio, thus increas- ing the overall impact of the educ- ational drive. To sum up, a dialogue has to be initiated between decision-makers in media and in public health. The object of that dialogue should be to heighten awareness among the media personnel about the important responsibility they hold for the health and well-being of their people, and equally to alert health professionals to their own re- sponsibility for ensuring that their health initiatives reach all people. Without this wholehearted backing from the media in conveying health messages to the greatest number of people , we risk having only Health for Some and not Health for All . • 19