The changing face of death: Implications for public health

Abstract

Palliative care and bereavement care attempt to foster greater dignity in death and loss. Yet the former has been criticised for ‘creeping medicalisation’ and the latter for individualising grief and loss to the ‘talking therapies’. In a broad sense, amongst the dying, their communities and advocates, there is growing recognition of the positive aspects of more collective responses to death to integrate the dying, public health and community. In response to Kellehear's call for public health to consider the above issues as a matter of priority, this essay describes the changing way death has been experienced and managed in empirical, conceptual, and theoretical terms. It then moves on to explore the implications for public health.

Keywords:

• Death and loss
• ‘good death’
• regulating death
• disadvantaged dying
• community involvement

Acknowledgments

Thank you to Darren Flynn for comments on the first draft of this paper. Many thanks also to the anonymous referees. The critical comments aimed at improving the clarity of this essay are much appreciated.