Modern Public Health Challenges

While modern medicine has made extraordinary progress, Britain continues to face significant public health challenges. Understanding these issues and the government's responses is essential for the final part of the AQA GCSE History: Health and the People specification.

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Lifestyle Diseases

In the 21st century, many of the biggest health threats are caused by lifestyle choices rather than infectious diseases.

Disease	Cause	Scale
Heart disease	Poor diet, lack of exercise, smoking, alcohol	Leading cause of death in the UK
Type 2 diabetes	Obesity, poor diet, lack of exercise	Over 4 million people in the UK diagnosed
Lung cancer	Primarily smoking	Around 47,000 new cases per year in the UK
Liver disease	Excessive alcohol consumption	Deaths have increased by 400% since the 1970s
Obesity	Poor diet and sedentary lifestyles	Around 28% of adults in England are obese