Images Save Life. The Role of Graphic Communication in Social Health Education

This article, starting from some considerations on learning processes based on visual communication and from an investigation on how communication health-related has historically made use of tools of the graphic sciences through specific languages, each time declined according to the historical context and the cultural level of the users, presents an excursus on the use and current role of graphics in the medical-health field. The critical position proposed aims to emphasise how, in this context, images fulfil their primary task of social education to form individuals capable of learning and critically interpreting the reality that surrounds them, not only protecting their own health but also implicitly assuming responsibility for protecting the safety of an entire social group.