Week Two: Digging Deeper and Making Connections

Throughout my time in Berlin, the connection between culture and Global Public Health has not been extremely obvious as I explored the city. A couple of observations I have made include the vast number of people who smoke cigarettes and the cigarette boxes with illustrations of possible side effects on them. Strong warnings on cigarette cartons host pictures of rotted teeth, people with cancer, and a plethora of other effects of cigarettes, but people are not strayed from their habits and can be seen smoking all day. This conflicts with the physical demands of bike riding that many Germans fulfill, as biking is a main form of transportation in Berlin.

The bike lanes bordering nearly every sidewalk in Berlin have become commonplace, however so has the suffocating smell of smoke. I am no longer surprised by walking past restaurants and seeing people smoking at the table or blowing smoke into the air in front of people passing them. The culture of heavy smoking with a straining form of transportation creates a clash in the culture that I have not been able to fully understand. However, the effort by the government to warn their citizens is a movement in the right direction for the health of German citizens. Furthermore, the active nature that is seen throughout all generations with bike riding instills a value for physical health. German culture and Global Public Health are connected through the strive for an overall healthier population with modes of transportation that require activity and adversaries found on all cigarette cartons.

In a more general sense, there are numerous links between culture and Global Public Health. The culture in the United States supports a more individualistic approach and this reflects in the healthcare, as not all people have equal access to quality healthcare. Furthermore, U.S. culture stigmatizes some diseases such as mental health or addiction and this causes people who are suffering from this disease do not want to seek help. Using this example, it can be seen how heavily culture influences Global Public Health.