I was taking a class on a functional medicine approach to digestion today when one particular graph the teacher presented jumped out at me. This was a graph of lifespan compared to healthcare dollars spent in the various countries of the world. The current lifespan in the United States is 77.5 years and the amount we spend per capita on healthcare is $12,555 per year. For a good
comparison, the average lifespan in China is about the same at 78 years and their expenditure for healthcare per capita is $945. The country with the highest lifespan is Japan at 84 years with a per capita health expenditure of $5,015 per year. If we want a bit of contrast, Cuba has a slightly greater lifespan than us at 78 years while their expenditure is about the same as China.
What the heck is going on? Of the top 100 financially affluent countries in the world, we rank 48th in lifespan, and yet we spend at least twice as much and sometimes more than 10 times as much on healthcare as these other countries! Something is very wrong here. Now I am not going to pretend to know the answers to these questions, but I can speculate on possible factors causing this insanity. We have two issues here
— the high cost and the poor mortality. Let's tackle the high cost first.
The US spends more money on medical research than any other country and as a result we have the highest quality and the latest and greatest medical gadgets, gizmos, potions, and elixirs to be had on the planet to help battle the evils of disease. Having all these really cool toys costs a big bag of cash. The problem is most of these cool toys don't do anything to increase our lifespan. They are great for saving
a life in an emergency, but they don't make us healthier or live significantly longer. I have witnessed far too many folks reaching the end of their lives only to spend vast amounts of money on life-saving interventions just to extend their lives a couple more months. We are so terrified and opposed to death in this country that we will spend anything just to hang on to a few more days, even when those days are miserable. I see this fear as part of what is driving up the costs of medical care in
the US. That is not to say that citizens of other countries don't have the same fear of death, but the culture of those countries does not see value in denying the inevitable. Our country is somewhat unique in believing that we are going to be able to beat death.
This observation is just a small part of a much larger perspective the US medical system and the US public in general has towards health. Our medical system was the product of the needs of the Civil War. The US government chose to financially support medical practices that heroically intervened and saved lives. While this is certainly a valuable perspective, particularly in a wartime mentality, it does not line up
with how the body works naturally. US medicine is built on the perspective of seeing the body as the enemy and wanting to override what it wants in order to achieve the results the doctor in charge deems best. This works well in emergency life or death situations, but it fails completely when it comes to producing health. Our approach to focusing on staving off death is, I believe, why we rank only 48th in the world for lifespan and yet we spend more money than everyone else. A
healthy life is so much more than just not being dead. If you don't respect that fact then death just comes that much sooner.
Basic good quality healthcare is not that expensive as all these other countries demonstrate. Heroic life saving interventions are very expensive. An additional expense is all the medical care that pretends to be heroic life saving interventions but really are a complete waste of time. The heart bypass surgery comes to mind. The cost of such a procedure is between $100,000 and $200,000 and it does not add one day of
extended life to the patient. Routine “necessary” exams and procedures cost us billions every year and more often cause more problems than they catch and prevent.
Then there is the entertainment of the pharmaceutical/oil industry. Yes, originally the creation of the US pharmaceutical industry was really just an offshoot of the US oil industry. Back in 1900, John D Rockefeller, the richest man in American history, controlled 90% of all oil production in America. About that time the use of petrochemicals to make other stuff suddenly took off. The biggest spin on this was the
formation of synthetic drugs. To make sure that this product would have a proper marketing staff, Rockefeller literally invented medicine in the US by financing the formation of almost every medical school in the US. Not surprisingly, these schools taught the use of his new petrochemical drugs as the answer to America's health needs. Back in those times, Chiropractic schools were about the only healthcare institutions that refused to be swallowed up by the oil industry. America's
heavy reliance on synthetic drugs is a big contributor to our healthcare costs. The average American is on five daily medications by the age of 70 and the cost of these medications in America is outrageous compared to the exact same medications in other countries. For instance, I was checking the cost of an asthma inhaler for a patient. In this country it costs over $240 and yet the exact same inhaler on Indiamart was $30. This could be contributing to our massive overspending for healthcare in
this country.
Okay, let's shift direction and ask why our lifespan is only 77.5 years while 47 other countries have done better than us in this regard. Many of the countries that are much worse than us face issues of not enough food to feed their people and little or no sanitation. These countries often have no drinkable water sources, significant issues with infectious diseases and parasites, and often a lack of physical safety
due to war and political systems. These are all real and common causes for not living to a ripe old age. None of these are our problems. So what is lowering our lifespan? Let's look at what is killing us. Eight of the ten biggest killers of Americans are chronic degenerative diseases like heart disease, cancer, strokes, Alzheimer's, Diabetes, chronic lung disease, kidney, and liver disease. The other two main causes of a shortened lifespan are accidents and because of the last few
years, Covid has been added to the list. To put this more clearly, degenerative diseases are diseases caused by bad food, environmental toxins, stress, not enough exercise, and too little sleep. These are lifestyle diseases. Iff we are dying faster than other modern cultures then it is because we have a crappier lifestyle than they do. Lifestyle is a choice. The American attitude toward life is producing choices that are generating poor health outcomes.
What I am saying is not news, but it is largely ignored by most people. When you look at cultures that promote a long and healthy life, you find a focus on family, community, and mutual support. Tradition is always very strong in healthy cultures. The focus is not on success and individual ego aggrandizement, but more on the moment to moment quality of life experience. By my observation, there seems to be a
great lie that most Americans have fallen into — that quality of life comes from having a lot of money. Nothing could be further from the truth. Once you make enough money to survive, more money doesn't make you happier. If you are living below the poverty level then of course quality of life and money are closely tied together. But once essentials are met, quality of life really comes down to the quality of your participation with others. Having lots of bling and a big ego does nothing to
fill up the emptiness inside your being.
This brings up the last bit of information I wanted to share on our poor lifespan concern. This topic is not listed on the usual lists of causes of death, but does show up in other areas. These are called deaths from despair. If this was listed on the big ten, it would be up there around number four or five because we are talking about around 200,000 deaths each year. These are the deaths from suicide, drug overdose,
and alcoholism. We are not the only country to have problems in this area, but the countries that rank better than us on the longevity scale are not big in these areas. This has to do with the lifestyle choices and cultural attitudes running people's lives in each country. The fact that our numbers are so high tells us a lot about how badly our current social climate is failing our citizens. I don't have answers for this. My job is to simply ask the right questions. The right questions cause us
to question our current beliefs and look at the facts reality is showing us about the consequences of our choices.
Take care,
David
Ellen
After I did the article on creatine Ellen asked if it could be used to rejuvenate the skin. I checked online and found that creatine is an ingredient used in many commercial products for that very purpose. Naturally I said "hey, I can make some of that up!" So I put some creatine in water with a little glycerin for hydration and put it into a rollerball applicator. We are both using it and time will tell if it makes
us young and beautiful again!
Manuka honey reduces breast cell cancer growth 84%
This nutraceutical is so effective that it is being considered as a a stand alone treatment for breast cancer. This special honey collected from Tea Trees by honey bees is already well known as an antibacterial agent. This research was done with estrogen sensitive breast cancer cells.
"The battleline between good and evil runs through the heart of every man."
~Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
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Constipation doubles your risk of heart attack
The research is suggesting that there is a common genetic basis for both conditions. The idea here is that if you suffer from chronic constipation, then you want to keep a real close watch on your heart health.
"Talent is always conscious of its own abundance, and does not object to sharing. "
~Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
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Brain flush !
One of the hallmarks of Alzheimer's is the gradual buildup of protein junk around the brain cells clogging up and blocking normal function. Normally the cleanup of this junk is handled by the brain version of a lymphatic system. But this system slows down with age. Prostaglandin, a drug used to induce delivery in pregnant women has been found to return this system back to full functioning
- at least in mice.
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