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Countries in which the government and taxes are paying for health care are much more attentive to the food supply and the environmental and industrial pollutants because the government has to foot the bill for the disease and disorders that they cause.
Thay also have much more preventative care. In the US, they treat the disease and don't focus that much on prevention.
I wonder how our life expectancy increased. I think we should point out what needs to be improved, but the food supply in the U.S. is very safe compared to the rest of the world and compared to 50 years ago. There is increasing awareness. The "We are being poisoned"comment amounts to hysteria.
We should make improvements. No skull and crossbones have to be put on our food and we also should realize there are no guarantees and chance will play a role. Remember Steve Jobs was a dedicated vegetarian that died far sooner than the average American that does not have the best eating habits. A lot of people eating these "poisonous" foods in moderation live to age 80 and beyond.
I think that it is by the public NOT paying attention to the contamination of our food that has gotten the government and industry into collusion to allow the highest profit rather than healthfulness and flavor be the goal of the food industry.
I think our diligence pays off and if there were not folks who sounded the alarms and complained at every chance we would be a lot worse off than we now are. I congratulate those who stay on top of such issues. They are doing a service to humanity.
A person can be a vegetarian with bad genes, but I think of President Clinton who watched his weight, religiously worked out each morning and ran faster and longer than his security people, and whose only bad habit (that could affect his health) was loving steaks and hamburgers. He got a heart attack and is now a vegetarian.
James Garner was a spokesman for the beef industry and died of a heart attack. Ruth of Ruth Chris' Steak House died of heart problems.
There is another angle on this. Society has an obligation to ensure that costs incurred onto society that are not in society's best interest long term are paid-in-full by those who benefit from such costs. We see this principle in action in cap-and-trade, fines for toxic waste dumping, etc. Currently, there are insufficient measures in place, of this sort, with regard to the food industry. CAFOs are permitted to build up massive manure lagoons, tainting water supplies with soluble nitrogen compounds and phosphorus, as well as having other environmental and health impacts. If these operations were made to pay all the costs to society that their modern methods incur, "natural foods" (such as meat grown on grass farms instead of CAFOs) would be the choice of everyone, because foods produced using modern methods are just another way society is mortgaging our children's future by allowing industry to operate in a damaging manner without paying the costs of that damage.
For more information on the example I provided, read "Eating Animals" by Jonathan Safran Foer.
You have a point. How about a cap and trade for the food industry?
If you put antibiotics in animal feed you are taxed, which goes to paying hospital bills for people with antibiotic resistant parasites such as MRSA. If you use saturated fats you get taxed which pays for heart problems. Lots of preservatives' taxes go to cancer patients. Too much salt will pay for high blood pressure meds for poor people.
The only tomatoes in my supermarket, all year round, that still tastes like a tomato are grape tomatoes and Campari. There are condos in New York where people have the bucks to actually import tomatoes, having them flown in on a regular basis, because ours are so gross. They are red and nice looking but have hardly any scent or flavor. I have even had canned tomatoes like this. All that is left of them is the color.
The only thing that I can think of that has improved in the last decade is Bird's Eye Steamfresh vegetables and the proliferation of soy milk.
There's too much profit to be made via a diseased society. I believe this is why health care in America is more about treating disease, not preventing it.
Last year the results of a large study that compared organic produce to non-organic produce showed that both had the same nutritional value and both tasted similar - the difference: Pesticide levels - the organic produce had substantially less pesticide residue.
I will take my produce with as little pesticide residue as possible thank you very much.
And the organic produce had higher levels of bacteria.
There's too much profit to be made via a diseased society. I believe this is why health care in America is more about treating disease, not preventing it.
Absolute bunk! As we've already ascertained, plenty of healthful options exist, usually at only slightly higher cost, and no one is prohibited from seeking them. And if these options were as effective as some of their advocacies claim, the world would quuickly beat a path to those peoples'' doors.
Below is a link to just one of many alternative health sites:
I'm neither endorsing it nor opposing it; I'm merely pointing out that the opinions there cover an enormous range, and as is always the case with such media, there is an extremist fringe for each subject.
And on top of all that, each individual is unique. What workes for you or me might not for the guy or gal next door. Some of it -- life span vs. life expectancy -- is genetic and not subject to much influence, if any, by changes in lifestyle.
Bur the maoi point I seek to make here is that a collection of over-indulged children, who have been conditioned to expect too much, too easily -- who would rther seek somebody to blame rather than deal with hard choices. -- can only make things into more of a crapshhot by running to Big Brother amd the Nanny-State for "helpl".
Are they increasing because we are healthier, or from the miracles of modern science?
I don't care which the net result is what matters. I would rather make it to 80 have fun and some occasional vices, than be a monk eating wheat grass all day and make it to 100.
James Garner is alive and Ruth Fertel died in 2002 of lung cancer.
Rockford Files what a great show taught me how to evade road rage incidents. Back to topic. I see old Jimmy is 84 that's a great life beef or no beef.
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