Health & Wellness
Food Inc. starts showings Kahala Mall this Friday, July 31
Food, Inc., the movie that shows how the food industry really works starts at Kahala Mall this Friday, July 31, 2009.
Only 1 in 7 change their lifestyle when told if they don't they will die - part 2
Aloha, yesterday's blog post generated a lot of comments, so many that I want to address a few with a second one. And of course, I forgot the most obvious action points for changing your lifestyle to save your life, which are very simple, people need to:
Only 1 in 7 change their lifestyle when told if they don't they will die
A quote from a motivational book states, "A recent study showed that when doctors tell heart patients they will die if they don't change their habits, only one in seven will be able to follow through successfully. Desire and motivation aren't enough: even when it's literally a matter of life or death, the ability to change remains maddeningly elusive."
Our President likes to discuss these matters over; burgers, beer and cigarettes
Andy Hawaii Blogger made a great comment on yesterday's blog post, he said, "Our President likes to discuss these matters over; burgers, beer and cigarettes". This is very insightful. A big part of the problem is that we have leaders who are not able to make real change because they are part of the problem, how can we expect people who are attached to eating burgers and smoking cigarettes to make meaningful changes to the most significant causes of the nation's health crisis - poor lifestyle and diet choices.
Health care debate misses the real solution
I continue to be amazed that the debate over changes to the nation’s health care system is not focused, or at least that a significant part of the debate isn’t about how to reduce the need for so much expensive medical intervention/treatment in the first place.
Legislative sledgehammer vs. fixing the problem
In an effort to address food-contamination issues—such as salmonella in spinach and peanuts—certain Congressmen and -women as well as U.S. Senators are pushing legislation that would bury American farmers, food producers and other food and cosmetic businesses in yet more red tape and regulations.
Malpractice Insurance and defensive medicine costs
Another cost to be considered in the access to health care debate along with the huge costs of lifestyle preventable diseases caused by tobacco and other intoxicants, diet, and lack of exercise that I blogged on yesterday, is the costs to the medical system of medical malpractice insurance. The actual costs are hard to come by but are of two types, direct and indirect (indirect costs are the costs of unnecessary tests and treatments ordered by doctors solely to protect themselves from getting sued).
Health care debate should be about how to reduce the incidence of disease
Speaking about tobacco health care related costs which are estimated at $96 billion per year, that figure is dwarfed by the health care costs and productivity losses associated with just 5 diet related chronic diseases which are estimated at $864 billion per year.
Tobacco health care costs equal to the cost of the President's health care proposal
As we are about to be asked to pay $1.5 trillion over the next 10 years in extending medical insurance benefits to almost everyone in the nation, President Obama's "struggle with smoking" becomes more relevant. The annual US health care costs related to tobacco related illness is estimated at an astounding $96 billion, with a further loss of productivity cost of $97 billion. The total health care and lost productivity costs per packet of cigarettes are estimated at $10.28, whereas the average cost of a packet of cigarettes including sales tax is less than half that at approx. $4.80.
Go to hospital; instead of needed painkillers get salt water and Hep C
In a scary case that makes it even more worrying to go to hospital, a medical worker injected the painkillers intended for patients into herself, then filled the used syringes with saline solution and injected the patients with that, exposing them to Hep C.