Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Saturday, August 8, 2009
P90X
I'm now 2/3 of the way through the P90X fitness program, so I'm going to put in a plug for it. I made a vow a couple of months back to get fit while I made some changes in my life.
I've never worked out to a DVD before, but I went ahead and bought this program based on the comments I saw online. It's a 90 day program, and I am now in Week 8. The first few weeks kicked my butt, but I have to say the program works. I do it every morning at 5:30.
I'll post up before and after stats when I get to day 90.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Saturday, August 1, 2009
US Healthcare Compared to European and Canadian Healthcare
Checkout the full story from the Hoover Institution.
The story:
Medical care in the United States is derided as miserable compared to health care systems in the rest of the developed world. Economists, government officials, insurers, and academics beat the drum for a far larger government role in health care. Much of the public assumes that their arguments are sound because the calls for change are so ubiquitous and the topic so complex. Before we turn to government as the solution, however, we should consider some unheralded facts about America’s health care system.
1. Americans have better survival rates than Europeans for common cancers. Breast cancer mortality is 52 percent higher in Germany than in the United States and 88 percent higher in the United Kingdom. Prostate cancer mortality is 604 percent higher in the United Kingdom and 457 percent higher in Norway. The mortality rate for colorectal cancer among British men and women is about 40 percent higher.
2. Americans have lower cancer mortality rates than Canadians. Breast cancer mortality in Canada is 9 percent higher than in the United States, prostate cancer is 184 percent higher, and colon cancer among men is about 10 percent higher.
3. Americans have better access to treatment for chronic diseases than patients in other developed countries. Some 56 percent of Americans who could benefit from statin drugs, which reduce cholesterol and protect against heart disease, are taking them. By comparison, of those patients who could benefit from these drugs, only 36 percent of the Dutch, 29 percent of the Swiss, 26 percent of Germans, 23 percent of Britons, and 17 percent of Italians receive them.
4. Americans have better access to preventive cancer screening than Canadians. Take the proportion of the appropriate-age population groups who have received recommended tests for breast, cervical, prostate, and colon cancer:
Nine out of ten middle-aged American women (89 percent) have had a mammogram, compared to fewer than three-fourths of Canadians (72 percent).
Nearly all American women (96 percent) have had a Pap smear, compared to fewer than 90 percent of Canadians.
More than half of American men (54 percent) have had a prostatespecific antigen (PSA) test, compared to fewer than one in six Canadians (16 percent).
Nearly one-third of Americans (30 percent) have had a colonoscopy, compared with fewer than one in twenty Canadians (5 percent).
5. Lower-income Americans are in better health than comparable Canadians. Twice as many American seniors with below-median incomes self-report “excellent” health (11.7 percent) compared to Canadian seniors (5.8 percent). Conversely, white, young Canadian adults with below-median incomes are 20 percent more likely than lower-income Americans to describe their health as “fair or poor.”
6. Americans spend less time waiting for care than patients in Canada and the United Kingdom. Canadian and British patients wait about twice as long—sometimes more than a year—to see a specialist, have elective surgery such as hip replacements, or get radiation treatment for cancer. All told, 827,429 people are waiting for some type of procedure in Canada. In Britain, nearly 1.8 million people are waiting for a hospital admission or outpatient treatment.
7. People in countries with more government control of health care are highly dissatisfied and believe reform is needed. More than 70 percent of German, Canadian, Australian, New Zealand, and British adults say their health system needs either “fundamental change” or “complete rebuilding.”
8. Americans are more satisfied with the care they receive than Canadians. When asked about their own health care instead of the “health care system,” more than half of Americans (51.3 percent) are very satisfied with their health care services, compared with only 41.5 percent of Canadians; a lower proportion of Americans are dissatisfied (6.8 percent) than Canadians (8.5 percent).
9. Americans have better access to important new technologies such as medical imaging than do patients in Canada or Britain. An overwhelming majority of leading American physicians identify computerized tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) as the most important medical innovations for improving patient care during the previous decade—even as economists and policy makers unfamiliar with actual medical practice decry these techniques as wasteful. The United States has thirty-four CT scanners per million Americans, compared to twelve in Canada and eight in Britain. The United States has almost twenty-seven MRI machines per million people compared to about six per million in Canada and Britain.
10. Americans are responsible for the vast majority of all health care innovations. The top five U.S. hospitals conduct more clinical trials than all the hospitals in any other developed country. Since the mid- 1970s, the Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology has gone to U.S. residents more often than recipients from all other countries combined. In only five of the past thirty-four years did a scientist living in the United States not win or share in the prize. Most important recent medical innovations were developed in the United States.
Despite serious challenges, such as escalating costs and care for the uninsured, the U.S. health care system compares favorably to those in other developed countries.
The story:
Medical care in the United States is derided as miserable compared to health care systems in the rest of the developed world. Economists, government officials, insurers, and academics beat the drum for a far larger government role in health care. Much of the public assumes that their arguments are sound because the calls for change are so ubiquitous and the topic so complex. Before we turn to government as the solution, however, we should consider some unheralded facts about America’s health care system.
1. Americans have better survival rates than Europeans for common cancers. Breast cancer mortality is 52 percent higher in Germany than in the United States and 88 percent higher in the United Kingdom. Prostate cancer mortality is 604 percent higher in the United Kingdom and 457 percent higher in Norway. The mortality rate for colorectal cancer among British men and women is about 40 percent higher.
2. Americans have lower cancer mortality rates than Canadians. Breast cancer mortality in Canada is 9 percent higher than in the United States, prostate cancer is 184 percent higher, and colon cancer among men is about 10 percent higher.
3. Americans have better access to treatment for chronic diseases than patients in other developed countries. Some 56 percent of Americans who could benefit from statin drugs, which reduce cholesterol and protect against heart disease, are taking them. By comparison, of those patients who could benefit from these drugs, only 36 percent of the Dutch, 29 percent of the Swiss, 26 percent of Germans, 23 percent of Britons, and 17 percent of Italians receive them.
4. Americans have better access to preventive cancer screening than Canadians. Take the proportion of the appropriate-age population groups who have received recommended tests for breast, cervical, prostate, and colon cancer:
Nine out of ten middle-aged American women (89 percent) have had a mammogram, compared to fewer than three-fourths of Canadians (72 percent).
Nearly all American women (96 percent) have had a Pap smear, compared to fewer than 90 percent of Canadians.
More than half of American men (54 percent) have had a prostatespecific antigen (PSA) test, compared to fewer than one in six Canadians (16 percent).
Nearly one-third of Americans (30 percent) have had a colonoscopy, compared with fewer than one in twenty Canadians (5 percent).
5. Lower-income Americans are in better health than comparable Canadians. Twice as many American seniors with below-median incomes self-report “excellent” health (11.7 percent) compared to Canadian seniors (5.8 percent). Conversely, white, young Canadian adults with below-median incomes are 20 percent more likely than lower-income Americans to describe their health as “fair or poor.”
6. Americans spend less time waiting for care than patients in Canada and the United Kingdom. Canadian and British patients wait about twice as long—sometimes more than a year—to see a specialist, have elective surgery such as hip replacements, or get radiation treatment for cancer. All told, 827,429 people are waiting for some type of procedure in Canada. In Britain, nearly 1.8 million people are waiting for a hospital admission or outpatient treatment.
7. People in countries with more government control of health care are highly dissatisfied and believe reform is needed. More than 70 percent of German, Canadian, Australian, New Zealand, and British adults say their health system needs either “fundamental change” or “complete rebuilding.”
8. Americans are more satisfied with the care they receive than Canadians. When asked about their own health care instead of the “health care system,” more than half of Americans (51.3 percent) are very satisfied with their health care services, compared with only 41.5 percent of Canadians; a lower proportion of Americans are dissatisfied (6.8 percent) than Canadians (8.5 percent).
9. Americans have better access to important new technologies such as medical imaging than do patients in Canada or Britain. An overwhelming majority of leading American physicians identify computerized tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) as the most important medical innovations for improving patient care during the previous decade—even as economists and policy makers unfamiliar with actual medical practice decry these techniques as wasteful. The United States has thirty-four CT scanners per million Americans, compared to twelve in Canada and eight in Britain. The United States has almost twenty-seven MRI machines per million people compared to about six per million in Canada and Britain.
10. Americans are responsible for the vast majority of all health care innovations. The top five U.S. hospitals conduct more clinical trials than all the hospitals in any other developed country. Since the mid- 1970s, the Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology has gone to U.S. residents more often than recipients from all other countries combined. In only five of the past thirty-four years did a scientist living in the United States not win or share in the prize. Most important recent medical innovations were developed in the United States.
Despite serious challenges, such as escalating costs and care for the uninsured, the U.S. health care system compares favorably to those in other developed countries.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Saturday, July 25, 2009
New Blog on the Science of Low Carbs
For a couple of years I have been following a blog called Gene Expression, which has posts on genetics research breakthroughs, the use of genetics to trace human evolution, and a lot of discussion on the politicization of science.
One of the bloggers at Gene Expression has created a new blog focusing on examining whether the human body has really evolved around a high protein, low carbohydrate diet. A lot of our obesity problems have arisen as a result of the ready availability of cheap carbs. But the health industry has been telling us the contrary: steer away from meat. Eat more carbs.
It passes the common sense test for me. Our species is about 200,000 years old in our current form. For most of that time we have been hunter-gatherers. The latest evolutionary breakthroughs that allowed us to get big brains and walk fully erect were when we were able to more effectively hunt. The idea that our ancestors were able to find two to three thousand calories per day, with most of them coming from carbs, is ridiculous. They had to be getting the bulk of them from meat. Try to plan a day's worth of meals equalling your maintenance level of calories without a significant amount of fat in the mix. You need a tremendous amount of food. More than someone could walk around and gather day in and day out.
Until the advent of agriculture, which happened only in the last 10,000 years. Certainly our bodies have started adapting to the new diet that agriculture has brought to us, but 10,000 years of evolution does not reverse the hundreds of thousands of years that came before.
Anyway, there are not a lot of posts up yet. But check them out at Low Carb Art and Science.
One of the bloggers at Gene Expression has created a new blog focusing on examining whether the human body has really evolved around a high protein, low carbohydrate diet. A lot of our obesity problems have arisen as a result of the ready availability of cheap carbs. But the health industry has been telling us the contrary: steer away from meat. Eat more carbs.
It passes the common sense test for me. Our species is about 200,000 years old in our current form. For most of that time we have been hunter-gatherers. The latest evolutionary breakthroughs that allowed us to get big brains and walk fully erect were when we were able to more effectively hunt. The idea that our ancestors were able to find two to three thousand calories per day, with most of them coming from carbs, is ridiculous. They had to be getting the bulk of them from meat. Try to plan a day's worth of meals equalling your maintenance level of calories without a significant amount of fat in the mix. You need a tremendous amount of food. More than someone could walk around and gather day in and day out.
Until the advent of agriculture, which happened only in the last 10,000 years. Certainly our bodies have started adapting to the new diet that agriculture has brought to us, but 10,000 years of evolution does not reverse the hundreds of thousands of years that came before.
Anyway, there are not a lot of posts up yet. But check them out at Low Carb Art and Science.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
GE Continues to Journey with Obama into Facism
Facism - the joining of corporate and government interests. State controlled economy. Hmmm.
More rent seeking by GE. GE has now hired Linda Daschle as a lobbyist. Linda Daschle is the wife of Tom Daschle, the former Senate Majority Leader and Obama's first pick as HHS Secretary. GE was one of Obama's top 20 sources of corporate funds in 2008.
Great comments at the link. Such as this one from someone named Rick Caird: "GE has become the perfect example of a so called capitalistic company engaging in pure rent seeking. They want Congressional subsidies for things like wind mills and others of their product lines. You mention MSNBC as being heavily skewed left, but we also see John Harwood at NBC who needs to get a room every time he talks about Obama. Then, there is the censoring at CNBC. Dylan Rattigan is gone after a rant on the government funded payouts by AIG to the the likes of Goldman and foreign banks. Santelli has been muzzled after his rant suggesting tea parties. GE is a prime example of a rent seeking company that should not be allowed to own media companies to pursue its rent seeking. Rick"
More rent seeking by GE. GE has now hired Linda Daschle as a lobbyist. Linda Daschle is the wife of Tom Daschle, the former Senate Majority Leader and Obama's first pick as HHS Secretary. GE was one of Obama's top 20 sources of corporate funds in 2008.
Great comments at the link. Such as this one from someone named Rick Caird: "GE has become the perfect example of a so called capitalistic company engaging in pure rent seeking. They want Congressional subsidies for things like wind mills and others of their product lines. You mention MSNBC as being heavily skewed left, but we also see John Harwood at NBC who needs to get a room every time he talks about Obama. Then, there is the censoring at CNBC. Dylan Rattigan is gone after a rant on the government funded payouts by AIG to the the likes of Goldman and foreign banks. Santelli has been muzzled after his rant suggesting tea parties. GE is a prime example of a rent seeking company that should not be allowed to own media companies to pursue its rent seeking. Rick"
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