Americans Are Seriously Sick 1519
jd writes "A study by US and British researchers on frequency of illnesses shows that even when you compare like groups in the US and the UK, people in the US are considerably sicker than their counterparts in the UK. This is after factors such as age, race, income, education and gender were taken into consideration. The most startling conclusion was that although the richest Americans were better off than the poorest Americans, they did no better (health-wise) than the poorest of the English. Previous studies of the entire population had shown similar results, with America placing around 25th amongst industrialized countries on chronic disease prevention, but it had been assumed that minorities and economics were skewing the results. This study suggests that maybe that isn't the case."
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:4, Interesting)
I wholeheartedly agree. Having worked for 10 years in the US and now happily back in the UK, the lack of meaningful time off is stressful and damaging. And don't get me started on the unpaid overtime culture in the US that appears to be protected by statute - in IT anyway.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
Even the U.S. obesity epidemic couldn't solve the mystery. The researchers crunched numbers to create a hypothetical statistical world in which the English had American lifestyle risk factors, including being as fat as Americans. In that model, Americans were still sicker.
I'm sure their methods were a little more rigorous than your heresay. I'd say that the GP is bang on, we're working ourselves to death.
Another interesting tidbit:
[...] the United States spends more on health care than any other industrialized nation, yet trails in rankings of life expectancy.
The United States spends about $5,200 per person on health care while England spends about half that in adjusted dollars.
Spending is only going to keep you alive for so long when you're overweight and out of shape from a poor diet and little exercise. That culture of 50 hour work weeks (or worse) just compounds these problems and shortens lives even more.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
Japan has the same minimum leave policy (10 days + stats), but on top of that, the leave policies are rarely enforced. It would normally be seen as selfish and inconsiderate of one's coworkers to actually use all of your leave, anyway. In many cases, company employees work completely unpaid "service overtime" out of obligation. Still, Japan is among the healthiest and longest-lived countries in the world.
I'd say there must be more to the picture. Like any complex system, the health of a nation probably can't be pinned on one single factor.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:3, Interesting)
Useless? I think minimum time off is certainly a factor. If you disagree, why not go & search for the information you're after and post it here?
Anyway, I can't find the exact statistics you're asking for, but this Wikipedia article on the working week [wikipedia.org] says the USA has a working year of 1777 hours vs UK's 1652. That's more than a three week difference (on a 40 hour week - 3 1/2 weeks for the French).
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
I would take 4 day meat left out than 4 day vegatables post consumtion. By your logic we shouldn't have any food because it gets disgusting.
4 day left out rice is very dangerous to eat, with rice usually the cause of food poisening that people get from Chinese.
I know some "healthy" vegatarians (who do the balanced diet thing) and they tend to look a little (I assumed they were vegatarians before I knew based on "healthy glow"). I do have to agree that they are less likley to be overweight, and the flew thing may be true too, but they also in general are sicklier and at least on parity in the depression department (sample of 5 or so, take with salt).
The real reason I am osting though is that I read a study that looked at people and found that heritage had a large part of what you were supposed to eat, with people from long established farming societies far more capable of living healthy on pure vegatables than people from coastal or nomadic societies. So eat what you were meant to could mean vegatables for you and meat for someone else.
Also, I would like to add that as a whole people probably shouldn't eat large courses of meat every day, but I know I tend to get hungry less often if I eat it a few times a week.
They mean, WHITE Americans (Score:2, Interesting)
Great. Of course as the comparison data, they must have used the non-Hispanic and non-mainland-European Brits to compare them to. I didn't know NHS would have that data available.
What if e.g. the Hispanic people would have showed to be healthier in US than in Latin America? Or Black Americans as opposed to Black British, Black Africans, Black Latin Americans, Black Swedish, Black Canadians and so on...
Why do they make the conclusion that ALL Americans are so and so, based only on selected WHITE Americans of a certain age? Because they still think there is a White MAJORITY of people?
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
"No doubt many other people are going to write in talking about "fat americans" being the problem - and its true that nutrition in America is a serious problem, but the comparison is to England, [bbc.co.uk] so not the cause of the differences."
I'd suggest you read TFC, TFA and then comment.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Nationality (Score:4, Interesting)
I remember being rather shocked a year or so back when a writer that is a favourite of mine on ESPN.com described the Commonwealth Games as basically being a European-only Olympics.
Well, that's utter rubbish, of course. Countries as geographically diverse as Canada, Australia, India and South Africa (and many, many more) are all in the Commonwealth. European nations outside of the UK, such as France, Germany, Italy and Spain, are not.
Commonwealth has nothing to do with Europe but, to some people at least, the two seem to be interchangeable, which is very worrying.
For anyone that's interested, the Commonwealth is made up of those nation states, territories and dependencies that were formally part of the British Empire that want to be in it, which is pretty much all former parts of the Empire bar a few exceptions, such as the USA and the Republic of Ireland.
By the way, I'm from London and when asked for my nationality I opt for whatever's the most appropriate choice. In some cases, that'll be English but in others, such as when travelling abroad, it'll be British. But, as the parent poster has pointed out, they're definitely not interchangeable terms.
Reasons (Score:1, Interesting)
2. Americans exercise too little; they sit in their cars for an hour to work, then an hour from work, and when they come home they are so tired that they can't do anything but watch TV and drink beer (plus having BBQ and mashed potatoes before bed time).
3. Americans are socially divided; since some parts of the US are like third world countries, it is to be expected that the lower stratum should be worse off than anywhere in Europe, where the poor at least have guaranteed access to medicine and doctors.
4. Americans don't give a shit about the environment, and is the premier polluter in the world. Pollution causes disease and death. For instance, the drinking water in most parts of the US are undrinkable, and contains various metals.
5. The American school system is to blame for giving the kids a bad dietary foundation. American schools serve pizza and hamburgers for lunch... and the P.E. in American schools also sucks.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
However, since differences in suicide rates are probably greatly overshadowed by other more common diseases and health standards, I don't think suicide have much to do with the discussion still. Both in Japan and USA is it a minority problem. Yes, Japan may have it be more common, but who knows why when countries with other stressful environments don't?
Nationalized Healthcare Good For Business (Score:5, Interesting)
Even if I didn't have the health condition, and were fit as a fiddle, I'd be doing the equivalent of driving without car insurance. I'm one serious traffic accident or cancerous tumor away from financial ruin if I don't have healthcare.
So, I turn down all kinds of consulting gigs, and leaf wistfully through my file of business plans, and wonder, do I love my country more than I love my career? I'm poorer and less fulfilled by living in a country without a single-payer system. I'm dependent on a corporate benefits package, and unable to pursue the American Dream.
I could emigrate to New Zealand in a heartbeat, as they're looking for tech workers there and would put me on an immigration fast-track. I really like Montreal and Halifax, too... but I'm a New Englander at heart, and I would like to stay where I feel I belong, where all my family and freinds are.
Now I find out that even with a company-funded HMO, I'm not as healthy, either. I mean. what the hell am I getting for my healthcare dollar? It's a serious chunk of change out of my paycheck and my employer's operating budget, and an expense that gets more and more and more expensive every year without returning much in the way of improvement in quality of service or quality of life. As far as I can tell, I'm just paying to fund Washington lobbyists and golden parachute accounts for HMO and Big Pharma execs.
I think it's time to put to rest the United State's overpriced, poorly managed and underperforming healthcare system, and join the rest of the civilized worl in the 21st century.
Re:Sweet tooth & work stress (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm sure it's got absolutely nothing to do with industrial pollution [uspirg.org]. Only a paranoid hippy would think that.
Strange Result (Score:5, Interesting)
(1) Being more sick more often won't actually make a difference to how long you can expect to live? Sounds implausible.
(2) Americans get sick more often but their health care is better so they live just as long or longer? Sounds more plausible, although it seems like too much of a coincidence that better healthcare is almost exactly balancing worse health.
(3) Maybe better access to health care in the US results in a higher rate of diagnosis, rather than a higher rate of illness? That would explain the nearly identical lifespan, but only if the better access to healthcare makes little difference to lifespan.
(4) A difference in medical culture, where doctors in the US are more likely to diagnose and attempt to treat problems that doctors in the UK would just tell their patients to live with? I know that psychiatrists and psychologists in the US are very quick to diagnose and prescribe drugs compared to Japan or New Zealand (the other two countries that I am familiar with). Maybe there is something similar going on with the medical profession in general.
Have to agree there (Score:2, Interesting)
Most saliently, I'm reminded of 'Chips or Crisps woman' - one morning an obese couple got on the bus with their daughter - the woman was so fat that she _did_ look like Fat Bastard from Austin Powers. And the kid was screaming, and she was asking '...what? what? you hungry? do you want chips or crisps......chips?.......crisps?'
This was at 7.30am, and I felt truly sick. The kid plumped for crisps btw.
Re:Attack of a Pride of Monkeys? (Score:3, Interesting)
It takes quite a bit more plumbing to digest plant matter. Cows have three stomachs, koala's have a huge ass appendix. We're much closer to carnivore in the internal piping than a vegetarian.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
Walking. Seriously!
In British cities, we generally do a lot of walking compared to US cities. I once asked *in the visitor's centre* for directions to the public library in a US city. After getting a load of driving directions, when I told them I didn't have a car, the woman behind the counter looked horrified, and was stunned into disbelieving silence for several seconds, before giving the classic response :
Turns out it was only a ten-minute walk away. And virtually every car I passed on the way honked at me. Why? Because they thought I was a bum - after all, only bums don't have cars, right?
I'm not saying this is true of every US city - certainly people seem to walk in New York, for example - but by way of contrast, I live in London and I probably do about an hour of brisk walking every day just getting between tube stations, the office, and my home. That's not counting actual "exercise time", that's just getting about day-to-day. Even when I used to work in the northern cities like Leeds and Stockton-on-Tees, which don't have the Tube, I still did about an hour walking around at lunchtime.
I'm not trying to troll here, but I think this picture says a lot : Only In America [msjc.net].
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Nationalized Healthcare Good For Business (Score:4, Interesting)
Otherwise, under your model of "insurance", I would be dead, as I'd quickly be pauperized to the point of no longer being able to afford medicine, doctor visits or emergency care. I fail to see how any system preventing this, "socialist" or not, is BAD.
It's nice to know the doctrinaire right-wingers really are out to kill me.
Variance in Climate Extremes? (Score:3, Interesting)
The recent influx of diseases like West Nile disease suggests a warmer north is facilitating the spread of tropical diseases. I believe there's a suggestion that tropical climates or climates with extended warm seasons and no freezing winters breed a greater diversity of diseases and disease carrying hosts. Heat is also a stress factor and can complicate bad air conditions.
It would be interesting to see the demographics broken down between the northern U.S. and the far south.
just my loose change
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
Wait, I thought the free market and privatization was supposed to make things cheaper? While state-run systems like the British NHS were supposed to be horribly inefficient and expensive?
Any economists care to explain what's going on here? Is the free market a failure, or is this the way it's supposed to be? Are those extortionate health costs translating into increased prosperity for America in some way?
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
The answer is indeed simple: among industrial nations one of the most significant predictors of health is the gap between rich and poor. The larger this gap, the worse the health of both groups. It is not surprising that poor people have worse health, but it is interesting that riches don't buy better health. More information is available here [washington.edu], and here's a related editorial [washington.edu] from Newsweek.
In short, the study looked at the following health factors: life expectancy, infant mortality, death rates, disability, quality of life, self-assessed health, happiness and well-being. The high-level summary from the linked article: "Populations whose income is below a threshold (about $5,000 - $10,000 in US per capita income) generally have poorer health. Increasing income in such societies leads to better health. Above the threshold, national health is not necessarily related to absolute income, but rather to the gap between rich and poor. Studies in the past 15 years found that where income gaps are smaller, health appears to be better."
The researchers' hypothesis is that societies with a large gap between the rich and poor have a more hierarchical organization. Such an organization is based on coercion and resignation. More egalitarian societies do not engender the negative emotions needed to sustain a hierarchy.
Perhaps what is most surprising is that despite the maturity of this research, it seems (at least to me) that very few people are aware of it.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
the other factor which comes in here which benefits the japanese is the way they eat or better, what they eat. A lot of fish, a lot of vegetables, green tea... To sum it up: they eat little fat and healthier stuff.
compare this to USA or UK, where fast food dominates what people eat, where coffee and coke often is the only stuff people drink the whole day.
other thing: the majority of my american coworkers here never go to doctors. they take pills and drugs the whole day. instead of changing their way of life, calming down, solving their personal problems, eating better stuff (!) they try to cure everything with drugs, drink coke the whole day, eat a kilo of steak every day and then complain that they suffer from heartburn and again take pills against heartburn
of course this is not representative, might be strange co-workers here. but on the other hand i noticed something the last time i was in new york when i watched TV ads: i have never travelled to a country where there are dozens of tv ads every hour for products to reduce heartburn - this confirms my observation. instead of eating different stuff people buy these drugs. this is obviosuly not the right solution. in the long run this affects your health.
Re:Call me a pessimist... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
I blame it on the fact that we don't have a true free market, privatized health care system. I mean, when was the last time you paid more than a deductable for your health care? Did you have a choice of more than one company for health care, choosen by your employer?
Truly privatized would be your work place paying you money to obtain your own health care. Whether you bank it and pay straight cash after that(frequently gets a 50% discount), or buy a health care insurance program, or some combination of the two is up to you.
For that matter, it's been estimated that half the cost of healthcare in the USA is paperwork. You have the clinics fighting the insurance companies for money. This costs money. I've heard about some doctors getting frustrated, then refusing to take any healthcare plans, finding that they can offer their services for cash, and still cover expenses while charging less than many people's deductables.
I'll also note on the whole 10 days thing that I've never heard of a place that doesn't give you at least two weeks. And there's plenty of people who don't get 'bank holidays'. 24 hour manned jobs, most storefronts, etc...
"Self-reported health issues"? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm British and I haven't been to the doctors in about five years. I know several people who aren't even registered with doctors. No-one I know of my age (36) has had tests for prostate cancer, checked themselves for testicular cancer or even has regular annual check-ups.
There's a possibility, IMHO, that relying on self-reporting of illness would produce this kind of result in the older generation of Brits, as they're still following the "just get on with life and don't bother the doctors" mentality of those who grew up in the aftermath of WWII.
My mother had a lot of pain in her lower back for years - when I eventually persuaded her to go to the doctors he got her to go to hospital. They did a scan of her lower back - nothing wrong with it - but noticed something wrong with one of her kidneys (it had never grown from when she was a child). So they took another scan higher up to have a better look at that. Then noticed something wrong with her liver. So they took another scan higher up and saw that she had severe cancer of the liver (despite her being a non-smoker and a very light drinker). She died about 6 weeks later.
She would never have thought of getting either her kidneys or her liver checked out. If she had then maybe she would still be alive. But, like so many people from her (and her parents) generation going to the doctor was only something you avoided as you didn't like to bother him/her.
As usual, your views may vary.
--
silas
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:3, Interesting)
I study malignant melanoma in particular, and the whole business is rather nasty. What bothers me the most about it is how completely unnatural everyday life has become: the materials we're exposed to in our day to day lives, our living environments and conditions... but it wouldn't do us any good to go all primitive and animalistic again, either. I think the price we pay to try to keep everyone alive, even adapting for mutations in genetics and malformed tissue, ie. the entire practice of medicine, is a consequence. To me it's fascinating.
Why do some people get skin cancer and some don't? I really can't advise people to stay out of the sun completely. My suspicion is that certain people are more susceptible than others, and we're just too young technologically to accurately guess who.
I apologize for being all over the place - my point is this: you healthy people think this is all so simple because your personal philosophy works for you. I assure you, this is no easy question.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
OK, maybe that is the factor.
How many redheads are there in Japan? Blonds?
Most Americans are more than broke (ie, in debt). Most Americans are cheap. We eat horrible, inexpensive, non-nutritional food. We have to worry about our cars being stolen, or if you get into a fender bender, you better pay that 15-25% of the cost of a (modest) car a year for insurance so you can drive your 4x4 SUV. Even if your a good boy and pay the health insurance extortion racket, I dare you to get sick. I double dare you to find good health care. Remember, most are broke and getting sick or in an accident is a major expense that is not included in our interest payments.
If you own a computer in the US, and you are knowledgeable, you have to be on the alert because people from all over the world are going to try to break into it, or at the least you have to deal with getting a ratio of 100:1 spam:real mail.
Keep in mind that we are broke and cheap, so we're always looking for a deal, right? Well, there is always someone looking to take your money, so those "deals" often don't work out as well as advertised.
Also, we have still have racial tension here. The legal and criminal system here is geared towards "controlling" minorities, but hey, if you're not a 2.1 kid bearing family, you too can be subject to being treated as a minority in the criminal justice system. Being a single, middle aged white guy, I have to pretend to be more "average" so that I can more easily hide myself from the police here.
Also, keep in mind that our legal system also favors businesses and corps over individuals. On average, in a year or two an individual can be sentenced to life in prison or execution. A lawsuit against a business or corp takes years upon years, and in the end its usually the lawyers and the business that benefit.
Yeah, Americans are sick, from the inside out.
market induced hypocandria (Score:2, Interesting)
If I lived in a hazy black and white world where colors might become unnaturally saturated, bright and vivid by taking a pill I might go get some. "If you think you might have any of these symptoms go see your doctor and ask about x... NOW!"
If you go to the doctor enough they will find something wrong with you and they will do something to cure it because you don't have to pay for it and therefore have no incentive to question their judgment. [Many] Doctors have become used car salesmen in white coats with fat wallets (remember Stanly Milgrams "Obedience to Authority"). It's no wonder that a doctors strike in Israel a few years ago caused havoc in the mortuary business after the strike had caused the mortality rate to drop fifty percent... would probably drop seventy-five percent in the states.
I wonder how many americans are sick compared to how many americans are actually sick.
On the other hand (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:3, Interesting)
As I'm pretty sure any American city would top even the most car-centric British city, maybe there is a link bettween car use and illness.
Re:Attack of a Pride of Monkeys? (Score:4, Interesting)
How about HYGENE (Score:2, Interesting)
- Clean your kitchen? Antibacterial soap!
- Slight cough? Penicillin!
- Washing yourself? Every day a shower.
From a CONSUMER point of view it would make sense to try to keep as healthy as possible by eliminating all those evil bacteria. Kill them, use extra-strong cleaning products. Slightly sick? Use penicillin or whatever other 'industrial strenght' medicine.
And america is of course on the very bleeding edge of consumer-driven marketing where each soap is antibacterial by now, cause it sounds sensible.
From a MEDICAL point of view however, this approach is not a good idea. It's all in the way diseases and bacteria propagate. Use some type of 'killer' on a colony of bacteria, they die.. until the time one lucky bacteria accidentally is resistent against the killer.. and that one lives, multiplies, spreads..
With the result that that strain of bacteria can not be killed by simple means anymore. Now if this would only apply to the common cold, then well sure. But you're in trouble when you (accidentally) hit the SERIOUS bacteria, and make those resistent too.
And so on.
The lesson is: 'Only fight what really NEEDS to be fought'
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
"Wait, those are walking directions. You've gotten yourself into a maze of one way streets. In a car I don't how you get there from here."
After a few seconds of thought I was able to send them in a big, mile long circle to get back to a spot I could have jogged to in about 30 seconds.
Reminds me of the time I was standing on Boylston Street in Boston and could see Mass Ave from where I was, but it took me over 20 minutes to drive there.
I'm not saying this is true of every US city - certainly people seem to walk in New York, for example
Been down to "The City" recently as it happens. I was telling a friend about my trip, starting at The Daily Show studio on W 52nd, down to CBs in the East Village, back to The Daily Show studio, down to Baggot Inn in the West Village, back to The Daily Show. About 15 miles in all. She started talking about the trials and tribulations of the NYC subway system.
"No, no," I said. "I walk."
"Ooooooh!" she replied. "You act like a native." (And technically I am)
Anyway, I'd posit that America's health problems are related to this, but not directly. In America you will find people who drive to the mall, take the elevator to the second floor gym; and then spend half an hour on a Stairmaster thingy.
This is really fucking bizarre behavior.
Americans, on the whole, even the obese Ding Dong eaters, are neurotically obsessed with health. This leads to behavior such as that noted above, and others such as the psychological reduction of food to some sort of medicine. "Take your six almonds a day to fight cancer."
But the one thing they absolutely will not do is simply live in a natural, healthy manner, and the combo of this with a health obsession makes them sick. It kills a lot of them.
Call it the Howard Huges Syndrome.
KFG
More attention is focused on serious diseases... (Score:3, Interesting)
Probably the best study I've found debunking the "utopia" of nationalized health care: 12 Popular Myths About National Health Insurance [cato.org].
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
Over the years, the pesticides and such that we use in farming have stripped the soils of these bacteria (among other things), which is why B12 supplements of some form have become pretty much a necessity for anybody (like myself) who tries to avoid all animal products.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:1, Interesting)
Goddammit give that man a cigar!!!
People in the US are concerned with the accumulation of "stuff", not quality of life, life experience, etc. In my neighbor's driveway there are two jet skis on a trailer, a boat, two SUVs, and in the garage is a motorcycle. We watched the Superbowl on his projection screen television that went for over five grand. This guy has so much stuff his house is about to burst, but has mentioned at times not putting away as much money as he'd like. This is suburban USA. I'd venture a guess that if he went without work for two months this would all implode and the payments would eat him alive. And before anybody bleats about anecdote, I'm going to say that empirically this is the norm in my part of the Midwest.
My wife and I make about 1.5 times what his household pulls in (garnered via casual conversation) and we've ridden jet skis, gotten our hands on a camper, etc. We rent that stuff. We also travel outside the country every other year, which was a habit gained by living in Europe while in the US military (and yes, we lived "on the economy"). We also put a shitload of money away. Yeah, we have a few vices (hides Powermac in the corner), but we also are more concerned about life experiences and quality of life and less about toy accumulation. Since I've given up the materialistic bent I had in the 90's and have more of a financial safety buffer I feel better, and am less stressed. When I'm less stressed I get ill far less often.
I dislike the French overall, but it cracks me up while US citizens crow about how lazy they are because of a 32-35 hours proposed work week (can't remember which it was). As they do this little by little many of them are working themselves into an early death as they try to compete with unregulated labor in the third world in the name of capitalistic competition. Call me when China and India have OSHA, social safety nets, and labor standards and then I'll try to compete. Until then I'll sit here working my base 40 hrs.
Food and nutrients? (Score:3, Interesting)
richer too (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:5, Interesting)
However - the main reason people in other parts of the world travel is to go and experience a different culture - that's something you're not really going to get in your own country.
The main reason Americans don't travel is because they know virtually nothing about the world outside of the US & everyone fears the unkown.
(Oh, and honestly, drop the "World's Best National Parks" in favour of "some of the most fantastic National Parks in the world").
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
It's all about Sleep (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:This is a trash study (Score:3, Interesting)
I've maybe been through ten various NHS proceedures / departments over the years. In only one case can I fault the treatment and/or level of care, and that was only because the ingrown toenail (full on surgery, was a bad one) which managed to retain some root and grow back. Even the nurses that came to my house to change the dressings were great, considering I was a whining teenager in pain.
Bitching about the NHS just seems to be the thing to do these days. From your experience, it sounds as though you've maybe been in and out hospital way more times than someone might choose to be. Without knowing more detail, I can't say whether or not you genuinely have been treated badly, or are perhaps just a little pissed off with the whole healthcare thing and are transfering those feelings onto the NHS.
Please don't take this as an insult or anything, but how do you treat people yourself? The phrase you used "The incompetence of our NHS, the apathy of their "professionals" and utterly abysmal levels of customer service" suggests to me that you yourself don't treat the staff very well. At the very least, you have no respect for them. What I'm trying to say here (without pissing you off) is that perhaps your own attitude might be part of the problem. I know that if I were a doctor or a nurse and had a patient that used quotations around the word professional when refering to my colleagues, that patient would get the minimum required treatment, while other, more deserving, patients get my help. Stands to reason.
Re:This is a trash study (Score:1, Interesting)
That really is nonsense. Impossible to get a referral - what? My GP gave me a wide choice. I have an NHS dentist. I've been hospitalised six times in the last 4 years and have never been infected with MRSA. In fact, the NHS is no worse than any other large organisation when it comes to administrative inefficiency or general incompetence.
Where I do agree with you is on American food, it is quite abominable, and most products are barely more than GM soya by-products and corn syrup held together with hydrogenated palm oil.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:1, Interesting)
just look at Gas stations. I dont care what anyone says, they all price themselves within 0.01 dollars of each other in the area. None will lower their prices by a significant amount to try and get more business. And seeing the insane profits they are making because their profit margin is much higher right now the "razor thin" profit line is a line of bullgrap.
There is a unspoken rule you do not undercut the others or suffer the wrath.
It's one reason I buy my stuff online only. Companies like Newegg dont do the same crap as the places like compusa,bestbuy,circuit city do. ($84.00 for a 512 stick of DDR400 is INSANE PEOPLE! there is no reason for that insane price inflation at local stores) the web makes it easier for many parts to be gotten for realistic prices. and the grey market stuff even helps more!
now only if I could buy Gasoline from online..... Get it from a Iranian seller for $$0.45 a gallon plus shipping and it will STILL be cheaper and they get a insane profit of me overpaying by 300%...
the free market is a major joke and anyone in reality knows this.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
I think the answer to this problem lies somewhere in a) reducing the amount of stress we put on ourselves and moreso on each other, and b) taking the initiative to do something that has lifelong benefits, e.g. at least 15 minutes of walking per day.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:2, Interesting)
I would have to agree with the last part of your comment. I lived in Germany for almost 6 years before coming to the US in 2003. Shortly after our arrival here, my wife and I noticed that we were getting bloated and constipated constantly, and my oldest son started showing behavioral swings and constant mood changes. We were eating basically the "same things" we used to eat in Germany, only in their american equivalents or similar products, or so we thought. I used to work for Microsoft in Germany and even though you could expect that environment to be full of pressure and stress, it wasn't. Here in the US, I did some consulting for a local company and even I as a consultant felt that I was expected to stay long hours and put in the ocassional saturday in. The president of the company where I did the consulting told me he had not had a vacation in over 8 years or so. In Germany, if you know how to combine your vacation time with regular holidays, you can really have some time to yourself and use it as you please.
Other things we have noticed is how little people move their bodies here in the US. In Germany people use their bikes to go everywhere. Here, we have neighbors who get in their cars to drive to the store across the street, literally. Yet, we hear them complain about how they don't understand where their extra body weight comes from. And let's not even talk about their refrigerators and pantries. Stuff worthy of being used to mummify human bodies.
I think it all adds up. Feed your body the wrong fuels, and it is forced to make up for it somehow. That in turn deteriorates your ability to cope with stress and disease. If you then replace proper hidration with diet sodas and sugary juices, you submit the body to further stress. Add long work weeks to this and little time off to enjoy life, and you have a deal breaker
Even though I like it here, I really can't wait for my wife to finish her Ph.D. so we can head back to Europe. I think I either read somewhere or heard someplace that "People in the US are taught that the american dream is worth dying for. The new European dream, with its take on social issues and general well-being is worth living for"
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:3, Interesting)
I know a guy who has an ambulance company that only works special events (movies, sporting events, anybody who wants an ambulance on standby) because he doesn't want to have to deal with insurance companies. He has about 4 ambulances and a bunch of EMTs and charges standard rates for being on standby and has a pretty good price for transportation to the hospital if someone does end up needing a ride.
Vegetarians are NOT immune to the flu. (Score:5, Interesting)
I know you'll shake your head at it like everybody does, but the typical vegetarian gets no cancer, never gets influenza (yes your flu last year could be avoided if you dumped meat) and will never have the depression, bowel disease, heart problems and overweight that inflict meat eaters!
I would like to point out that I was vegan for three years and vegetarian for ten, and that I enjoyed the flu a half-dozen times in that stretch. People making claims like this are idiots.
I eat a little fish now, on advice from several doctors who were kind enough to point to well-done studies that argued for the health benefits. There is no reason that eating some meat is bad for you. There are, however, problems with getting an excess of iron (in men), too much fat from the wrong meats in excess, and so forth-- but the same downsides are true of anything with a lot of bioavailable iron or fat.
Meat does not magically cause the flu.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:3, Interesting)
Likewise, one of my best friends has a father who is a doctor and he figured out what sort of insurance claims had the highest repayments (profitability) so he went out of his way to find patients suffering from related problems so he could turn in what were, basically, inflated claims. (He got in a LOT of trouble for it, too.) But he, also, was charging what the market would bear -- more from insurance companies than from individuals.
Obviously, your experience is different, but I think there's a lot of variety, depending on the doctor and the situation.
Re:Answer is easy. (Score:1, Interesting)
Example 1: When my son broke his arm, we needed to get X-Rays. We went down to the medical imaging specialist. When they asked about insurance, I said "None". She then laid out the following payment plans: They could bill me @ $70 (i.e. what they charge the insurance company for the hassle of paperwork sent in, sent back, queried, subject to public inquiry and recycled as firelighters) or I could pay $27 right there. Guess which one I chose?
Example 2: My wife requires a particular medicine daily. For a $20 copay she can get the 30 day supply that our insurance company authorizes. Or for $25 cash on the spot she can get a 90 day supply. Any guesses which supply she gets?
With that said, there are types of healthcare that don't respond well to a free market economy. I'm not going to price shop ambulance companies while I'm bleeding to death in the street. But that doesn't mean that there's nothing in the entire field of health care that couldn't be improved via some open free market competition
Re:This doesn't make any sense (Score:1, Interesting)
No you can't. Not even a tiny fraction of a percent. I assume you have savings? The bank you've placed your saving in could collapse. Don't think it'll ever happen? Then you're niave. What if you were involved in an accident and were sued? Do you have seperate savings to cover those potential costs? What will you do if the economy took a long slide and wiped out the value of your savings? How about your wife files for divorce, gets a good lawyer and takes you for every penny? Do you have a seperate "Divorce Settlement Fund"? What if you sucumb to a long term illness? Most peoples savings wouldn't even begin to cover the treatment costs for the first year. Do you believe your insurance company wouldn't try to drop you?
You've "planned". Right, of course you have. If you live in Happy Fun Land.
There's a reason for this. (Score:3, Interesting)
Medicine is horribly out of date in this way, and I'm not saying this to excuse them, because it really needs to change.
That doesn't count for pharmacy, obviously. I assume that probably has to do with some kind of price negotiation between the companies, but I don't really know.
Re:Call me a pessimist... (Score:2, Interesting)
The healthcare system is designed to make profits, not to keep people healthy.