Reflection On The Era Of The COVID-19 Pandemic: People Are More Aware That Health Investment Is Very Important

“When you walk into the operating room, you realize how precious health is” – Steve Jobs

JAKARTA - Maintaining health is one form of investment. Health is one of the main focuses of humans to survive. Maintaining health is not easy, lifestyle triggers the decline in body condition to the emergence of various diseases.

However, since the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been an attitude of awareness in the community about the importance of maintaining health so that the body has immunity.

The COVID-19 virus has become a worldwide pandemic, the body needs immunity as a fortress so it is not easily infected. People also make various efforts to increase endurance.

Starting from the easiest and cheapest activities such as sunbathing in the morning, light exercise, cycling to taking supplements, and drinking traditional spices.

Health Expenditures Increase

Based on the 2021 National Socio-Economic Survey (Susenas), although it is still at 5 percent, the allocation of spending on health as a component of non-food costs has increased in the last three years.

Maintaining immunity as an effort to maintain health takes the largest portion compared to other expenses. Scores of morbidity and health complaints also decreased.

The pattern of increasing expenditures in disease prevention efforts in the last three years has shown an increase, as an indicator of public sensitivity to prevent health problems.

In mid-2021, spending on health was recorded to have increased by 0.28 percent compared to the previous year, from 5.07 percent to 5.35 percent. The increase was mainly in urban areas, while spending on health in rural communities has tended to decline.

Health expenditures made by households include treating, preventing, or purchasing drugs. The goal of treating still dominates with 63.29 percent. And prevention goals are distributed almost half of health spending with an increasing pattern.

Prevention Approach

The adage "prevention is better than cure" is true. Because it's best to do prevention by taking care of our bodies before the disease strikes, rather than taking medical action.

From the Susenas data, it was also noted that the public's sensitivity to prevention efforts for health has increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, there was a significant increase of 7.64 percent from 15.18 percent in 2019 to 22.82 percent in 2021.

This increasing trend occurs in both urban and rural areas. Health maintenance is mostly done in an effort to maintain the body's immunity. The rising trend of spending on prevention during the pandemic is also influenced by the increase in medical tests such as PCR or antigens.

The Susenas survey also captures the decline in health complaints experienced by the community, including the number of illnesses in the last three years. This happens because it relates to the various prevention efforts that have been carried out.

There has been a decrease in the number of people who feel health complaints in the last month. From 32 per 100 Indonesian population, it will decrease to 27 in 2021.

In urban areas, health complaints and morbidity rates are higher than in rural areas. Influenced by various factors such as lifestyle, food consumption including air pollution.

However, increasing public awareness to prevent health is a positive symptom to form healthy human resources during the COVID-19 pandemic era.