Which factors of globalization are affecting quality

Trade and movement of infected cattle and poultry across national borders may also have contributed to recent outbreaks of mad cow disease in the Northern hemisphere and avian influenza in Asia. The globalization of trade is particularly relevant for health services that have become a commodity that can be traded in distinct ways.

First, health services can be provided across borders. Examples include a range of telemedicine tools, such as tele-diagnostics and tele-radiology as well as medical consultation through traditional and electronic channels.

Second, patients can travel abroad to receive health care or use certain facilities—the UK government recently allowed UK patients to seek treatment in the European Economic Area Lowson et al , Other countries, including developing ones such as Cuba and India, openly advertise to attract foreign patients to their clinics and hospitals. Third, health services themselves have become an industry that attracts foreign investments.

Several transnational companies from developed and developing countries have already created commercial health services through the purchase and establishment of hospitals Chanda, Fourth, the international movement of health personnel across borders has become a significant component of the trade in health services and has attracted considerable attention in the scientific and lay press.

Similar to trade, globalization has had large effects on international travel, with serious consequences for global health. The liberalization of the airline industry in many countries has made air travel affordable for more and more people around the world, which has led to a dramatic increase in the amount of global air travel. Sutherst estimated that about one million people travel internationally every day and a similar number travel between developed and developing countries each week.

Another recent report Gossling, put the number of global tourist arrivals per year at million. Far-reaching air travel, aided by improvements in aircraft technology that allow longer nonstop flights, facilitates the spread of communicable diseases. It is entirely possible that a person in the early stages of an infectious disease could be halfway around the world in 12—15 hours and thus function as a vector for that disease, aiding its spread, perhaps into vulnerable, non-immune populations.

SARS was first recognized in February in Vietnam where cases of atypical pneumonia with an unknown cause began to appear. By the first week of May , 30 countries on six continents had reported a total of more than 7, probable cases with more than deaths WHO, a.

Coronaviruses with their typical crown corona -like appearance under the electron microscope. HCW, healthcare workers. Another example is the global spread of antibiotic-resistant Pneumococcus that was first identified in Spain in the early s and rapidly jumped to South Africa and the USA before spreading to all other parts of the world WHO, Each year, approximately two million children die in developing countries as a result of lower respiratory infections, mostly pneumonia.

The exact origin of this Pneumococcus strain is still unknown but is likely to come from the Far East McGee et al , Perhaps the most profound changes that have taken place during the past 10 years have come through the globalization of ideas and information, facilitated through the revolution in information technology. The internet, satellite television broadcasting and high-speed data links across the globe have dramatically increased access to all kinds of information, even in the most remote corners of the world.

Despite early concerns about a 'digital divide' that would further disadvantage the poor, these fears have been overestimated. The reality is that this divide is narrowing between rich and poor countries that have increasing access to cell phone communication and the internet The Economist , The success of the food and tobacco industries' aggressive marketing strategies mentioned above have been closely linked to this information revolution.

Although better access to information is certainly a good thing, it has also created fears that freely available scientific information might be abused by terrorists Beck, Should the full sequence of the anthrax bacillus or smallpox virus and other virulent pathogens be published if this data could be used to develop biological weapons? Another example is the development of an improved virus to kill mice that has created fears that the enhanced virus could be used for bioterrorism Finkel, There is another inherent danger that comes with the vast flood of information now available through the internet, namely the reliability and accuracy of health information from various web sites Eysenbach et al , Many such sites contain wrong, misleading and even dangerous information Crocco et al , , and the lay public are often more confused than informed when they search for health advice.

Without doubt, globalization poses risks to global health, but it also provides benefits. The extraordinary improvements in information technology have dramatically increased the speed and ease of data flow, thereby facilitating the sharing of information.

Leveled by. Monday, December 23, Put simply, globalization is the connection of different parts of the world. In economics, globalization can be defined as the process in which businesses, organizations, and countries begin operating on an international scale. Globalization is most often used in an economic context, but it also affects and is affected by politics and culture.

In general, globalization has been shown to increase the standard of living in developing countries, but some analysts warn that globalization can have a negative effect on local or emerging economies and individual workers.

A Historical View Globalization is not new. Since the start of civilization, people have traded goods with their neighbors. As cultures advanced, they were able to travel farther afield to trade their own goods for desirable products found elsewhere. For more than 1, years, Europeans traded glass and manufactured goods for Chinese silk and spices, contributing to a global economy in which both Europe and Asia became accustomed to goods from far away.

Following the European exploration of the New World, globalization occurred on a grand scale; the widespread transfer of plants, animals, foods, cultures and ideas became known as the Columbian Exchange.

The Triangular Trade network in which ships carried manufactured goods from Europe to Africa, enslaved Africans to the Americas, and sent raw materials back to Europe is another example of globalization. The resulting spread of slavery demonstrates that globalization can hurt people just as easily as it can connect people.

The rate of globalization has increased in recent years, a result of rapid advancements in communication and transportation. Advances in communication enable businesses to identify opportunities for investment. At the same time, innovations in information technology enable immediate communication and the rapid transfer of financial assets across national borders. Improved fiscal policies within countries and international trade agreements between them also facilitate globalization.

Political and economic stability facilitate globalization as well. The relative instability of many African nations is cited by experts as one of the reasons why Africa has not benefited from globalization as much as countries in Asia and Latin America.

Benefits of Globalization Globalization provides businesses with a competitive advantage by allowing them to source raw materials where they are inexpensive. Globalization also gives organizations the opportunity to take advantage of lower labor costs in developing countries, while leveraging the technical expertise and experience of more developed economies.

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Huynen, M. The health impacts of globalisation: a conceptual framework. Global Health 1, 14 Download citation. Received : 31 January Accepted : 03 August Published : 03 August Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:. Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article. Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative. Skip to main content. Search all BMC articles Search. Download PDF. Abstract This paper describes a conceptual framework for the health implications of globalisation.

Introduction Good health for all populations has become an accepted international goal and we can state that there have been broad gains in life expectancy over the past century. Population health As the world around us is becoming progressively interconnected and complex, human health is increasingly perceived as the integrated outcome of its ecological, social-cultural, economic and institutional determinants.

Figure 1. Multi-nature and multi-level framework for population health. Full size image. Table 1 Determinants of population health Full size table. Globalisation There is more and more agreement on the fact that globalisation is an extremely complex phenomenon; it is the interactive co-evolution of multiple technological, cultural, economic, institutional, social and environmental trends at all conceivable spatiotemporal scales. Table 2 Features of globalisation Full size table. Conceptual model for globalisation and health We have identified the need for global governance structures, global markets, global communication and the diffusion of information, global mobility, cross-cultural interaction, and global environmental changes as important features of globalisation.

Figure 2.