HEALTH AWARENESS VERSUS ECONOMIC AFFLUENCE AS DETERMINANTS OF HEALTH STATUS : A COMMUNITY BASED EPIDEMIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS.

A community-based cross-sectional analytic epidemiological study was undertaken to compare the health status of school children from two villages and to see the association of the school children's health status with the level of health awareness among parents and teachers. The two villages had only one major difference, i.e., one had an agriculture-based economy and was more affluent than the other village. The study, however, revealed that the overall morbidity and nutritional deficiencies were significantly less (p < 0.01) and immunization status significantly better (p < 0.01) among school children of the less affluent village, possibly because level of health awareness was significantly higher among parents and teachers of this village as compared to the more affluent one (p < 0.01). The importance of health education has been reinforced by this study.