PEDIATRICS Vol. 95 No. 5 May 1995, pp. 687
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HOW TO IMPROVE PUBLIC HEALTH

Doctors and other health workers are even less able to assure happiness than they are to assure health. If work is unsatisfying to many in modern society, psychopharmacology is a toxic and inappropriate remedy for correcting the resulting tension and alienation. if unemployed workers are depressed, mental-health counseling may be a temporary source of comfort, but the only genuine solution is full employment. If children fail to thrive, child-guidance workers may diminish their misery, but they cannot guarantee their flowering in the midst of social disaster. As physicians, our daily practice with human ailments makes us aware of the extent to which problems of ill health flow from failures in our political, economic, and social institutions. The redesign of these institutions is the central challenge for the coming century, and gives the greatest promise for improving public health.