Many of us who have promoted wellness since Dr. Dunn have gone to some lengths to distinguish the term from related concepts with which it is sometimes confused, such as holistic health, prevention, health education and health promotion. I certainly do not think it is the same as these related concepts and programs. Holistic health, for example, is treatment oriented and practiced by healer-types. One of the early distinctions of the wellness movement was to present health issues as an alternative to doctors, drugs and disease. A related idea is to be wary of terms in common use that do not really mean what general usage of the words might imply.
Health insurance is actually a system for arranging payments for medical services.
The latter can not make you well, only help you deal with illness. The paradox of health is that while we are living longer, we are not living in a manner consistent with the highest possible quality of life. And a lot of people, it seems, would sooner worry about this situation than act so as to be healthier. One of the areas of wellness that I have emphasized is helping people better appreciate what it means to be a healthy person, as opposed to just not being sick. Having clear pictures of health at the heights of well-being make it more likely that mediocrity will not be found acceptable.