Hi Everybody,
PRETTY BAD- In yet another study on the health of Americans, we rank very close to the bottom in overall health compared to other countries. This is not just bad for our country in terms of health (a country filled with sick people is an unhealthy country), but it is also bad for us financially.
According to most reports on the subject, the increasing cost of keeping sick Americans alive is the number one budget breaker for the US economy. We are getting increasingly sicker, relying more on very expensive interventions to keep us alive despite our bad health, which is costing us more and more.
Eventually, experts believe the cost of healthcare will hit a point where we just won’t have enough money to pay for it.
WE HAVE IT “TOO” GOOD- According to the newest reports, Americans live their entire lives sicker and die younger than any other civilized country. Even though this trend has been obvious for some time, the new report evidently was so bad it “stunned” the researchers.
The researchers felt that maybe Americans did not know how bad it had gotten. We don’t think that is the case – most Americans we know talk regularly about how out of shape they are. We think that as Americans, on the whole, we have become privileged and lazy.
Fast food is simply too easy and cheap not to eat. Watching TV all day is simply too easy not to do. Other countries simply do not have these options to the extent that we do. It is human nature to be tempted by such things. Even animals in the wild become lazy when they have food readily handed to them so that they don’t have to work for it.
SOLUTION- There is no easy way to say it – you will have to get up and move, as well as make yourself eat better. In other countries, these things are not choices. In those areas, people are often forced to walk more to get around. Here, we can drive everywhere we want to go. And you can order almost anything off the internet so that you don’t even have to get up and go any where if you don’t want.
In other countries – though this is changing – they do not have as much fast food options as we do, and have more locally grown foods not exposed to chemicals. They don’t have to make an extra effort like we do to get healthy foods.
The lifestyle we are afforded in America is a very fortunate thing. However, the downside is the ease of becoming lazy, reliant on fast foods and reliant on powerful medications and surgeries to fix the side effects of our lifestyles.
A SIDE NOTE- As a side note, the one thing researchers found that did seem to make Americans stand up and take notice was the fact that our children were going to be sicker, weaker and live shorter lives than children in other countries.
For some reason, it does not bother us so much knowing how sick we have become, but thinking about the same fate for our kids seems to spur us to action.
Hope this helps,
Dr Matt and Dr Robin
mattandrobin@yahoo.com (email)
This week’s bit of Useless Information: The USA paid $200 billion to cable companies to provide the US with fiber internet. The companies took the money and didn’t do anything with it.
This email is courtesy of Matthew Barnes, D.C. and Robin Barnes, D.C. Neither this nor any of our emails are intended to be medical advice and should not be taken as such. They are opinion and are for informational purposes only. None of the nutrients discussed here are meant to diagnose, treat, or cure any disease.