The Impact of Beliefs on Health in Singapore

The belief in ‘Yin’ and ‘Yang’ dates back many generations in Chinese belief and health is said to be the balance of both Yin and Yang in the body. Similarly, the beliefs of many Malays (25%) and Indians (11%) in the community in indigenous medicine such as traditional Malay and Ayurveda believe that natural elements like temperature and weather impact health the most. However, the belief and association in religion and spirituality may have negative impacts on health as well.

For example, the practice and the use of Traditional Chinese Medication (TCM), acupuncture, or self-medicating by Buddhists or Taoist that represents 33% and 9% of the population respectively, can result in adverse effects and can often be fatal especially when inaccurately. Nonetheless, the greater 61% of the Woodlands population that are Chinese in Chart 3 engage in the use of TCM and this is evident through the many available TCM clinics in Woodlands such as Singapore Chung Hwa Medical Instituition, and Ma Kuang TCM clinic. Socio-economic Status (SES): It has been established that low socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with poor health.

Housing, then, is said to not only reflect one’s wealth and socio-economic position but also as a determinant of health. Wee at el. (2012) defined in a particular study that living in public rental housing equated to having low SES and living in an owner-occupied housing as having high SES. Therefore, to qualify for public rental housing, total monthly gross income should not exceed S$1, 500. This equates to 18% of the population of woodlands. Housing in Singapore, however is not geographically segregated according to SES as there is a mixtureA study carried out in Singapore by Low et al. in 2016 concluded that people with low SES tended to have a higher risk of being admitted into the hospital or visited the emergency department more. A review by Chan, Lee & Low (2018) revealed that people who lived in public housing had lower participation numbers when it came to health screening. The Singapore government has various schemes in place to aid such citizens such as Medishield, Medisave, and Eldershield for the elderly and Community Health Assistance Scheme (CHAS).

Despite these, it was found that people that lived in public housing had tendencies of refusing to turn to Western-trained doctors for primary care especially for chronic illness such as ischaemic heart disease. The Ministry of Social and Family Development defines an aged person as someone who is more than 65 years of age. Therefore, the 4% increase in people aged 65 and above and the 6% decrease of those aged 15 and below from 2010 to 2018 reflected in both Chart 1(a) and (b) signifies that there is an ageing population that ails the Woodlands population. The ageing population calls for more long-term care facilities such as nursing homes and home care services.

In Woodlands, this issue is address through the availability of nursing homes such as Man Fut Tong Nursing Home and Orange Valley Nursing Home. Woodlands is preparing for the growing aged population through the development of the Woodlands Health Campus that would be home to an additional 1, 800 beds to aid in the care of chronic illnesses in the community. Furthermore, the recent opening of ‘Kampung Admiralty’ encourages active living for the elderly by providing health facilities, senior care services, eating places and living spaces all in the same building. With an ageing population, it gives rise to chronic diseases such as ischaemic heart disease (IHD).

The Ministry of Health cites that IHD is the third leading cause of death in Singapore chalking up to 18. 5% of all deaths in 2017. A study has elaborated that IHD would usually affect people aged 65 years and above and complications such as cardiogenic shock, heart failure and case fatality often increase as a person age. This is especially important in the Woodlands community that is home to many older people more than 65 years of age. Furthermore, the higher male population in Woodlands is of concern as males have a higher prevalence of cardiovascular mortality compared to females.