Health serves as an objective prerequisite for social activity in any efficient social structure. The position of people in an unequal system influences their behaviour and society's resources through socio-cultural and socio-economic factors in the health sphere. The concept "health" and its opposite term, "illness", are subjective phenomena of culture, and not only the characteristics of a body's physiological state. However, semantically, in modern Russian consciousness, "illness" has far-reaching associations. The sociological context of public health is extremely important. From the social point of view, health is presented as an objective factor for the self-actualisation of individuals in society; consequently, it is one of the parameters of the quality of life for individuals and social groups. The results of this research can serve as a basis for a comparative analysis of health and disease in various cultures, the importance of which is emphasised in the literature.