3 ms·

1. This entire article and thread is about cancer, so I'm not cherry picking. If anything the broad "health outcomes" is a diversion from the main subject. 2.

1. This entire article and thread is about cancer, so I'm not cherry picking. If anything the broad "health outcomes" is a diversion from the main subject. 2. What percentage of poorer "health outcomes" are due to the US's ~33% obesity rate and overall horrid diet and have nothing to do with care or access?

burkaman 8y ago
You're right about 1, sorry. Obesity and diet are very much related to care and access. If you can't afford to go to the doctor unless you're dying, nobody is going to tell you when your cholesterol is getting too high and you should adjust your diet, or your blood sugar is getting into the warning zone, or whatever. We have such high obesity because we don't focus enough on preventative care, and lots of people can't afford preventative care even if they want it.
- 5trokerac3 8y ago
  Thanks for acknowledging that. It's not something you commonly see in forums. I have a hard time swallowing the idea that obesity and diet are related to access to medical care. Our great great grandparents undoubtedly had far less access to healthcare than even the average lower class, modern American, and yet obesity was almost non-existent for their generation. Occam's razor would say that an epidemic of diet related illness is caused by a societal shift in diet. The simplistic boiling down of the complex answer from nutrition experts is that the massive increase in processed foods in the American diet, post WWII, along with the insane increase in sugar consumption, have led to the obesity and diabetes epidemics (and increasingly believed to be one of the main causes of cancer). IMHO we could do exponentially more for the life expectancy of poor Americans by solving the problem of food deserts than by upending the entire medical system, that is functional for the majority, for a wholly bureaucratically controlled system - which, by the way, will eventually have to include decisions on which people do not get access to treatment.
cannonedhamster 8y ago
Regarding obesity, there's a belief that's indicated by some studies that show obesity is related to causing cancer in younger people by clogging up the works and preventing your immune system from killing off the cancer cells.

burkaman 8y ago

You're right about 1, sorry. Obesity and diet are very much related to care and access. If you can't afford to go to the doctor unless you're dying, nobody is going to tell you when your cholesterol is getting too high and you should adjust your diet, or your blood sugar is getting into the warning zone, or whatever. We have such high obesity because we don't focus enough on preventative care, and lots of people can't afford preventative care even if they want it.

5trokerac3 8y ago
Thanks for acknowledging that. It's not something you commonly see in forums. I have a hard time swallowing the idea that obesity and diet are related to access to medical care. Our great great grandparents undoubtedly had far less access to healthcare than even the average lower class, modern American, and yet obesity was almost non-existent for their generation. Occam's razor would say that an epidemic of diet related illness is caused by a societal shift in diet. The simplistic boiling down of the complex answer from nutrition experts is that the massive increase in processed foods in the American diet, post WWII, along with the insane increase in sugar consumption, have led to the obesity and diabetes epidemics (and increasingly believed to be one of the main causes of cancer). IMHO we could do exponentially more for the life expectancy of poor Americans by solving the problem of food deserts than by upending the entire medical system, that is functional for the majority, for a wholly bureaucratically controlled system - which, by the way, will eventually have to include decisions on which people do not get access to treatment.

cannonedhamster 8y ago

Regarding obesity, there's a belief that's indicated by some studies that show obesity is related to causing cancer in younger people by clogging up the works and preventing your immune system from killing off the cancer cells.