health changes over time

Question 1

Improvements in Australia’s health status since 1900 and reasons for these improvements, focusing on policy and practice relating to:

Answer 1

Overall. Health status has improved in Australia since 1900. However, while there have been changes in life expectancy since 1990, there have also been changes in the leading causes of mortality. The diseases that were common in Australia during the first half of the 20th century are in many ways different from those that Austrlians face now.

Question 2

Infectious and parasitic diseases

Answer 2

Were the leading cause of death in Australia in the first part of the 20th century

This was largely due to the living conditions that people experiences at that time (unsafe water and sanitation, indoor air pollution, contaminated food supply)

Children were particularly susceptible to these conditions and infant mortality rates were around 20 times higher in 1900 than they are today.

Question 3

Cardiovascular disease

Answer 3

Being a leading cause of death since 1900, rates increased in the early part of the 1900’s, reaching their peak in the 1960’s.

Question 4

Cancer

Answer 4

Been a leading cause of death since 1900, rates increased in the early part of the 1900’s, reaching their peak in 1980’s.

Question 5

Respiratory disease

Answer 5

Respiratory diseases such as pneumonia, influenza, asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have also decreased overall between 1900 and 2018.

Question 6

Injury and poisoning

Answer 6

Since 1900 death rates for injury and poisoning more than halved both males and females, with the most rapid decline occurring from the 1970’s.

Reduced rates of deaths from road traffic accidents and workplace injuries contributed significantly to this change.