Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Others define it as the absence of mental disorder. Some say that a person is mentally healthy if he or she is able to function reasonably well and is emotionally and behaviorally stable. Mental health can itself be defined variously. A person may be physically strong, resistant to infection, and able to cope with physical hardship and other features of his or her physical environment and still be considered unhealthy if his or her mental state, as measured by behaviour, is deemed unsound. There are further problems in settling upon a definition of human health. A seven-foot-tall basketball player may be in excellent physical condition (although outside the range of normality for height) but may or may not be in good health-depending, for example, on whether the individual has fallen victim to an attack of influenza. Moreover, physical condition and health are not synonymous terms. Thus it can be seen that, unlike disease, which is frequently recognizable, tangible, and rather easily defined, health is a somewhat nebulous condition and somewhat difficult to define. However, should the individual come in contact with that allergen again, even 20 or 30 years later, he or she may suffer anything from a mild allergic reaction-a simple rash-to severe anaphylactic shock, coma, or even death, depending upon the circumstances. If the person never again comes in contact with the antigen that causes the allergy, all other factors remaining normal, he or she will remain in that state of health. (2) A “healthy” individual may have developed an allergy, perhaps during early childhood, to a single specific substance. If, however, the sugar content remains elevated two hours later, this condition is abnormal and may be indicative of disease. Only a few examples are necessary to illustrate the point: (1) It is physiologically normal for an individual to have a high blood sugar content 15 to 20 minutes after eating a meal. SpaceNext50 Britannica presents SpaceNext50, From the race to the Moon to space stewardship, we explore a wide range of subjects that feed our curiosity about space!īad health can be defined as the presence of disease, good health as its absence-particularly the absence of continuing disease, because the person afflicted with a sudden attack of seasickness, for example, may not be thought of as having lost good health as a result of such a mishap.Īctually, there is a wide variable area between health and disease.Learn about the major environmental problems facing our planet and what can be done about them! Saving Earth Britannica Presents Earth’s To-Do List for the 21st Century.
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