5 ms·

The real epidemic in the USA: diabetes and obesity

9 points by EGreg 5y ago

The fact is, the USA leads the world in two of the leading factors correlated to bad coronavirus outcomes — obesity and diabetes. The epidemic has been here for decades, with even CHILDREN experiencing both obesity and diabetes — largely as a result of the US food industry, with its genetically engineered crops, putting sugar and high fructose corn syrup in everything. The government actually subsidizes this crap. And to top it all off, the health insurance system in the USA is worse for these people than almost all developed countries in the world. In other countries, people go to the doctor when they feel like they should. In the USA many people don’t even get preventative checkups! 25% of diabetics report having to ration their insulin. This is the highest rate among any developed country. Yet we are also among the richest per capita. Despite being mega rich, the USA has failed its population in terms of public health. Everyone, including children, is fed a diet that produces the highest rates of obesity and diabetes on the planet. And don’t get me started on the factory farms and the overuse of antibiotics, to save a buck. The superbacteria this can lead to will represent another health crisis in hospitals that might dwarf this pandemic — I hope I am wrong. Using Capitalism for everything is short sighted and bad for public health. Polluting your drinking water (I’m looking at you Michigan) or putting lead in pipes and asbestos in walls (Trump still loves the material) or switching to producing all your bottles from NON-biodegradeable plastic to save a buck, have long term consequences the market doesn’t worry about. Under a capitalistic system, we have very few incentives to investigate generic drugs as treatments for pandemics, compared to resemdivir and other patented drugs. With something like Ivermectin that can kill 99.9% of the virus in vitro, you’d think governments should want to push industry to investigate it in vivo. You’d be wrong. https://c19ivermectin.com/ Here is the largest compendium of studies on Ivermectin in one place. How many take place in the USA? All we see is small studies planned in clinicaltrials.gov and few results. But around the world, the results are finally coming in.

EGreg 5y ago
While fiscal conservatives in the USA are fearmongering about how we are all going to pay for universal health insurance, most countries already do so. Hong Kong and Singapore — the two countries that top economic freedom lists every year — have publicly run hospital systems. Preventative checkups alone can save a lot of lives, not to mention improve the economy. In this case, if it ain’t patented, there is no money in investigating it. Billions are spent to promote patented drugs and vaccines, of course, in the name of public health. But you want a real libertarian policy recommendation? How about starting an open source movement in drugs, where people are FREE to build on each other’s ideas without fear of the government coming in and enforcing “intellectual property” for helping save people’s lives? Jonas Salk gave away the polio vaccine without a patent, and now it is nearly eradicated! Imagine what we could do if our scientists freely collaborated, instead of competing to extract rents and using the govenment as the enforcer. We don’t have to imagine — it happens in every scientific department except biochemistry, where big pharma has it on lockdown. Public funds are used to discover treatments, then private industry slaps some patents, uses the government to enforce them and neither the NIH nor any other public agency receives anything back from their massive profits. And what do we get from this strictly enforced system of “intellectual property” in pharma? Drugs in the USA are vastly more expensive than the same exact drugs distributed in other countries, including countries with the same cost of living. This happens because we enforce the scarcity on researching ideas ourselves. And then turn around and prevent our existing single payer systems from negotiating the prices. I’m looking at you, Medicare Part D, written by pharma execs and implemented by aides to congresspeople who quit right afterwards and went through a revolving door to work for big pharma. The regulatory capture is real. Our society needs to be based less on competition and desperation from the lower class, and more on collaboration and plenty for everyone. We would all be much better off. Here is my policy proposal I wrote 10 years ago: http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=93 http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=93
- codegeek 5y ago
  fyi. Your SSL cert. expired 12 days ago.
al2o3cr 5y ago
something like Ivermectin that can kill 99.9% of the virus in vitro Hydrogen peroxide can do better, try injecting that and see what happens. You'll definitely not get or spread COVID!
- EGreg 5y ago
  Why not do large scale double blind studies? The URL linked above summarizes the many that have been made with Ivermectin.
  - slater 5y ago
    yep, we should def do double-blind studies with hydrogen peroxide
giantg2 5y ago
It's not just the drugs that are the problem, at least for obesity and diabetes. Many of our health issues could be prevented improved with exercise, diet, and other moderation. But why would we if we can just take a pill for it? We are lazy, largely as a product of out rich and over consumptive society.
codegeek 5y ago
"putting sugar and high fructose corn syrup in everything" I think about this a lot lately. Pretty much you are eating sugar/high fructose corn syrup if you buy anything from grocery stores other than just pure and raw vegetables/meat. So it seems like unless you can cook really well and have a lot of time to cook continuously 2-3 meals a day, you are out of luck. I have 2 kids and if we don't cook, our choices are pretty clear. Almost everything has sugar/fructose thing in it. Incredible. Not to mention that the ease of fast food everywhere (I can get to a MickyD, BurgerKing etc in mins).
Bostonian 5y ago
You don't catch obesity and diabetes from others, the way you do covid or influenza, so "epidemic" is the wrong word.
jstgord 5y ago
I feel people might be less immediately/aggressively/cynically dismissive of Ivermectin if they were aware of the recent Pasteur Institute study showing Ivermectin reduces Covid symptoms in animals : https://doi.org/10.15252/emmm.202114122 https://doi.org/10.15252/emmm.202114122

9 points by EGreg 5y ago

EGreg 5y ago

While fiscal conservatives in the USA are fearmongering about how we are all going to pay for universal health insurance, most countries already do so. Hong Kong and Singapore — the two countries that top economic freedom lists every year — have publicly run hospital systems. Preventative checkups alone can save a lot of lives, not to mention improve the economy. In this case, if it ain’t patented, there is no money in investigating it. Billions are spent to promote patented drugs and vaccines, of course, in the name of public health. But you want a real libertarian policy recommendation? How about starting an open source movement in drugs, where people are FREE to build on each other’s ideas without fear of the government coming in and enforcing “intellectual property” for helping save people’s lives? Jonas Salk gave away the polio vaccine without a patent, and now it is nearly eradicated! Imagine what we could do if our scientists freely collaborated, instead of competing to extract rents and using the govenment as the enforcer. We don’t have to imagine — it happens in every scientific department except biochemistry, where big pharma has it on lockdown. Public funds are used to discover treatments, then private industry slaps some patents, uses the government to enforce them and neither the NIH nor any other public agency receives anything back from their massive profits. And what do we get from this strictly enforced system of “intellectual property” in pharma? Drugs in the USA are vastly more expensive than the same exact drugs distributed in other countries, including countries with the same cost of living. This happens because we enforce the scarcity on researching ideas ourselves. And then turn around and prevent our existing single payer systems from negotiating the prices. I’m looking at you, Medicare Part D, written by pharma execs and implemented by aides to congresspeople who quit right afterwards and went through a revolving door to work for big pharma. The regulatory capture is real. Our society needs to be based less on competition and desperation from the lower class, and more on collaboration and plenty for everyone. We would all be much better off. Here is my policy proposal I wrote 10 years ago: http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=93 http://magarshak.com/blog/?p=93

codegeek 5y ago
fyi. Your SSL cert. expired 12 days ago.

al2o3cr 5y ago

something like Ivermectin that can kill 99.9% of the virus in vitro Hydrogen peroxide can do better, try injecting that and see what happens. You'll definitely not get or spread COVID!

EGreg 5y ago
Why not do large scale double blind studies? The URL linked above summarizes the many that have been made with Ivermectin.
- slater 5y ago
  yep, we should def do double-blind studies with hydrogen peroxide

giantg2 5y ago

It's not just the drugs that are the problem, at least for obesity and diabetes. Many of our health issues could be prevented improved with exercise, diet, and other moderation. But why would we if we can just take a pill for it? We are lazy, largely as a product of out rich and over consumptive society.

codegeek 5y ago

"putting sugar and high fructose corn syrup in everything" I think about this a lot lately. Pretty much you are eating sugar/high fructose corn syrup if you buy anything from grocery stores other than just pure and raw vegetables/meat. So it seems like unless you can cook really well and have a lot of time to cook continuously 2-3 meals a day, you are out of luck. I have 2 kids and if we don't cook, our choices are pretty clear. Almost everything has sugar/fructose thing in it. Incredible. Not to mention that the ease of fast food everywhere (I can get to a MickyD, BurgerKing etc in mins).

Bostonian 5y ago

You don't catch obesity and diabetes from others, the way you do covid or influenza, so "epidemic" is the wrong word.

jstgord 5y ago

I feel people might be less immediately/aggressively/cynically dismissive of Ivermectin if they were aware of the recent Pasteur Institute study showing Ivermectin reduces Covid symptoms in animals : https://doi.org/10.15252/emmm.202114122 https://doi.org/10.15252/emmm.202114122