Describes our health dilemma.
We obviously have a mental health crises. It is worsening over time. I’ve alluded to this in previous posts. Briefly, here’s how are politicians are addressing the issue: The Left’s Solution More funding, expanding coverage via Medicare/Medicaid/Obamacare, expanding coverage for substance abuse, emphasizing social determinants of mental health – education, poverty, housing. The Right’s Solution …
The Enlightenment was an era (around the 17th/18th century) that changed people’s trust from authority to science and reasoning. That was revolutionary for the time. But while we do rely much more on reasoning than the dictates of a King or ruler to tell us what is right or wrong, in general we lack self …
What health related progress have we made over time? As I mentioned in a previous post, rates of infectious disease have plummeted dramatically over the last few decades. Life expectancy has increased (at least until very recently). Why? Mostly this is due to vaccinations, antibiotics, food security, basic healthcare and sanitation. It really had very …
Last week’s post included a list of various chronic diseases that we are suffering from at higher rates than our paleolithic ancestors. Included in that list, to the surprise of many, were certain types of cancers. We have good evidence to link colon, breast, lung and prostate cancers to modern lifestyles. These are all among …
Best estimates are that homo sapiens have been roaming the Earth for ~315K years. For >95% of that time we lived as hunter gatherers. In comparison to our paleolithic ancestors we suffer from a large number of diseases that used to be rare. How do we know that? Obviously there are no writings from that …
Once in a while someone will come along having watched some sort of health documentary asking if its true that doctors don’t learn about nutrition in medical school. If not, they take it as a fact that medical schools are not particularly interested in nutrition or even worse are aligned with Big Pharma to push …
In theory, we ought to have a system in place that rewards those who bring benefit to individuals and society and disincentivizes those who bring harm. And yet, contrary to what we’ve been taught in school that is not the system we have in place. In fact, in many cases, companies profit most when they …
Resolving to exercise more and eat healthier? Unfortunately, most of us will give up on our yearly New Year weight loss resolution well before year end. Before long, we’ll blame ourselves and our lack of will power. Not to let anyone off the hook but maybe it’s not a will power issue, maybe there is …
There is a trend below which is a problem if you are concerned about health: Outside Food = Less Healthy Food I wrote a post explaining why mixing capitalism, food, and human biology predictably leads to chronic disease (though it is not inevitable and we can do something about it – see the orange box …
Earlier this year the US Surgeon General, Vivek Murthy called attention to an unusual epidemic affecting us: an epidemic of loneliness. Because it’s something we’ve all experienced it, many of us are not surprised. On the other hand, it is unusual given that our lives are simultaneously more interconnected than in the past. What’s going …
