Nature and Scope of Public Health
Discuss the nature and scope of public health, with particular reference to the views of Professors Milton Terris and Kerr White. To discuss the nature and scope of public health it first requires a definition. A widely accepted definition of public health has rarely been arrived at. ... Terris, in his article, (Terris, 1992) paraphrased the 1920 definition of CEA Winslow, by changing some of the wording to incorporate modern understanding and public health philosophy. His definition is as follows (with the variations from the original in italics) – “Public health is the science and the art of preventing illness and disability, prolonging life, and promoting physical and mental health and efficiency through organised community efforts for the sanitation of the environment, the control of infectious and non-infections diseases as well as injuries, the education of the individual in principles of personal hygiene, the organisation of services for the diagnosis and treatment of disease and for rehabilitation, and the development of the social machinery that will ensure to every individual in the community, a standard of living adequate for the maintenance of health.