Abstract
In this chapter, it is argued that in order to achieve public health goals we must go beyond individual health literacy. This chapter first looks at current definitions, strategies and actions of public health. Since health literacy is a public health goal, three perspectives are used: infectious diseases, population-based cancer screenings and chronic diseases management. In this chapter the discussion of the concept of health literacy responsiveness is introduced and the argumentation is built upon the idea that increasing systems’ health literacy responsiveness may be equally or even more important than attempts to increase individual health literacy.
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Bitzer, E.M., Schwendemann, H.E. (2021). The Significance of Health Literacy for Public Health and Health Promotion. In: Saboga-Nunes, L.A., Bittlingmayer, U.H., Okan, O., Sahrai, D. (eds) New Approaches to Health Literacy. Gesundheit und Gesellschaft. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-30909-1_5
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