Re: Study: Canadians healthier than Americans

[Guest guest]

Hi Lee. There's nothing unusual about this report. One should look

at mental health as well. An estimated one in a hundred Americans is

considered to suffer from a Psychotic illness, albeit not full-

blown, full-point Psychopathia. This compares to (again an estimate)

one in two-hundred in the UK for instance, and less in Canada, but

one should look at this per pro the level of population.

Anybody at all can look at the level of gun-homicides in the US

(approx., 11,000 a year) and the peculiar mental state of a country

that allows this to continue is obvious.

Mike.

>

> Study: Canadians healthier than Americans By MIKE STOBBE,

Associated

> Press Writer 31 minutes ago

> ATLANTA - You can add Canadians to the list of foreigners who are

> healthier than Americans. Americans are 42 percent more likely

than

> Canadians to have diabetes, 32 percent more likely to have high

blood

> pressure, and 12 percent more likely to have arthritis, Harvard

> Medical School researchers found. That is according to a survey in

> which American and Canadian adults were asked over the telephone

> about their health.

>

> The study comes less than a month after other researchers reported

> that middle-aged, white Americans are much sicker than their

> counterparts in England.

>

> " We're really falling behind other nations, " said Dr. Steffie

> Woolhandler, a co-author of the Canadian study.

>

> Canada's national health insurance program is at least part of the

> reason for the differences found in the study, Woolhandler said.

> Universal coverage makes it easier for more Canadians to get

disease-

> preventing health services, she said.

>

> , a RAND Corp. researcher who co-authored the American-

> English study, disagreed. His research found that England's

national

> health insurance program did not explain the difference in disease

> rates, because even Americans with insurance were in worse health.

>

> " To me, that's unlikely, " he said of the idea that universal

coverage

> explains international differences.

>

> Woolhandler said her findings were different in at least one

> important respect: In the Canadian study, insured Americans and

> Canadians had about the same rates of disease. It was the

uninsured

> Americans who made the overall U.S. figures worse, she said.

>

> The study, released Tuesday, is being published in the American

> Journal of Public Health. It is based on a telephone survey of

about

> 3,500 Canadians and 5,200 U.S. residents in 2002-03. Those

surveyed

> were 18 or older.

>

> The results are based on what those surveyed said about their

health.

> In contrast, the researchers in the American-English study

surveyed

> participants and also examined people and conducted laboratory

tests

> on them.

>

> The new study found that 6.7 percent of Americans and 4.7 percent

of

> Canadians reported having diabetes; 18.3 percent and 13.9 percent,

> respectively, reported having high blood pressure; and 17.9

percent

> and 16.0 percent said they had arthritis. The Americans also

reported

> more heart disease and major depression, but those difference were

> too small to be statistically significant.

>

> About 21 percent of Americans said they were obese, compared with

15

> percent of Canadians. And about 13.5 percent of the Americans

> admitted to a sedentary lifestyle, versus 6.5 percent of

Canadians.

> However, more Canadians were smokers — 19 percent, compared with

> about 17 percent of Americans.

>

> About 42 percent of the Americans rated their quality of health

care

> as excellent, while 39 percent of Canadians did.

>

> Also, 92 percent of American women said they had a Pap test within

> the last five years, while 83 percent of Canadian women had. But

> Canadians have lower death rates from cervical cancer. " It's a

little

> hard to interpret, " Woolhandler said.

>

> One more plus for the Americans: Fewer than 1 percent said they

were

> unable to get needed care because of long waits, compared with 3.5

> percent of Canadians.

>

> However, about 80 percent of Americans had a regular doctor, while

85

> percent of Canadians did. And nearly twice as many Americans said

> there were medicines they needed but couldn't afford (9.9 percent

> versus 5.1 percent).

>

http://news./s/ap/20060531/ap_on_he_me/healthier_canadians_7

>

[Guest guest]

Hi Mike, And the point is that America needs a national health

insurance program. Americans have a right to health care that is as

good as that in Canada and England. Americans cannot permit the

American Medical Association and its anti-competitive efforts to stop

this.

[Guest guest]

Hello Lee. I couldn't agree more with you on that point. A friend of

mine, in NJ is disabled and in a wheelchair. He suffers cataracts and

various other illness, yet cannot seem to get anything done about them.

This is a health board, so here's something directly related to health.

A BBC programme has just been transmitted showing that the Bush

administration has been " dumbing-down " the Global warming issue by

editing, deleting facts and altering scientific reports which show

that the Human race is indeed affecting our planet, by polluting it

with CO2 and other greenhouse gasses. It isn't surprising really as he

is accountable to oil and energy companies, and many of the directors

of them are still on his " board " or have been.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/panorama/5005994.stm

Click: " watch the latest Panorama " to see the programme, on the right

hand panel of the site.

This is a controversial subject of course, and I have posted this

elsewhere to the (seemingly) unintelligent people, unfortunately all

Americans who have fallen for the Bush line, hook line and sinker.

Mike.

>

> Hi Mike, And the point is that America needs a national health

> insurance program. Americans have a right to health care that is as

> good as that in Canada and England. Americans cannot permit the

> American Medical Association and its anti-competitive efforts to

stop

> this.

>

[Guest guest]

Shortly before Mr Bush was elected to his first term he was queried about global warning. "I think it's something we have to learn more about," he replied. Well, that's all nice and dandy, albeit something of a cop-out. Five years later and during the first months of his now presidency he was asked the same question. His response? Unchanged. How long does it take this man to learn? Global warming, disease control/prevention, disaster relief .... in the face of these, Mr Bush often has the expression of a deer hypnotised by headlights as he goes silent as a stone. Alterntaively, he chuckles a bit and puts on his aw-shucks-I'm-just-a-country-boy act. Either way, he comes across as a ninkompoop.Mike <mikesey_97@...> wrote: Hello Lee. I couldn't agree more with you on that point. A

friend of mine, in NJ is disabled and in a wheelchair. He suffers cataracts and various other illness, yet cannot seem to get anything done about them.This is a health board, so here's something directly related to health.A BBC programme has just been transmitted showing that the Bush administration has been "dumbing-down" the Global warming issue by editing, deleting facts and altering scientific reports which show that the Human race is indeed affecting our planet, by polluting it with CO2 and other greenhouse gasses. It isn't surprising really as he is accountable to oil and energy companies, and many of the directors of them are still on his "board" or have been.http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/panorama/5005994.stmClick: "watch the latest Panorama" to see the programme, on the right hand panel of the site.This is a

controversial subject of course, and I have posted this elsewhere to the (seemingly) unintelligent people, unfortunately all Americans who have fallen for the Bush line, hook line and sinker.Mike.>> Hi Mike, And the point is that America needs a national health > insurance program. Americans have a right to health care that is as > good as that in Canada and England. Americans cannot permit the > American Medical Association and its anti-competitive efforts to stop > this.> . Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. -Dr.Seuss . It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing. - Duke Ellington . Never place a period where God has placed a comma. - Gracie

[Guest guest]

Hi Mike, This is indeed a health board so I do want to discuss other

health issues here. I am sorry for your friend and hope that he will

push to get help. If he is disabled then he should have access to

the doctors who can help him.

The debate regarding global warming is not settled yet

The Tempest By Achenbach

Sunday, May 28, 2006; W08

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-

dyn/content/article/2006/05/23/AR2006052301305_pf.html

But I figure that a society that can do the below can probably kill

the entire planet.

An Alert Unlike Any Other: A nuclear waste vault in New

Mexico will long outlive our society. Experts are working on

elaborate ways to warn future civilizations.

By Piller, LA Times Staff Writer May 3, 2006

CARLSBAD, N.M. — has a simple and unequivocal message

for the people of the year 12006: Don't dig here.

As chief scientist of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant,

oversees a cavernous salt mine that is the first geological lockbox

for the " fiendishly toxic " detritus of nuclear weapons production:

chemical sludge, lab gear and filters laced with tons of radioactive

plutonium.

Nearly half a mile underground, workers push waste drums into

crystalline labyrinths that seem as remote as the moon. A faint salty

haze glows in powdery beams from miners' headlamps and settles on the

lips like a desert kiss. Computer projections predict that within

1,000 years the ceilings and walls will collapse in a crushing

embrace that seals the plutonium in place.

But plutonium remains deadly for 250 times that long — an unsettling

reminder that some of today's hazards will outlast the civilizations

that created them. The " forever problem, " unique to the modern

technological age, has made crafting the user manual for this toxic

tomb the final daunting task in an already monumental project. The

result is a gargantuan system that borrows elements equally from

Stonehenge and " Star Trek. "

Communicating danger may seem relatively straightforward, but

countless human efforts to bridge the ages have failed as societies

fall, languages die and words once poetic or portentous become the

indecipherable marks of a long-forgotten scribbler.

To future generations, warnings about 's dump may seem as

impenetrable as the 600-year-old " Canterbury Tales " are for all but a

few scholars today.

" No culture has ever tried, self-consciously and scientifically, to

design a symbol that would last 10,000 years and still be

intelligible, " said B. Givens, an anthropologist who helped

plan the nuclear-site warnings. " And even if we succeed, would the

message be believed? " ...

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/la-fi-

forever3may03,0,4009494.story