Life Choices
Aren't we all imbued with free will and at least a modicum of good sense? To evaluate how we might best live our lives, taking cautionary measures to ensure that we enjoy good health? Is it too much to ask of mature individuals that they take the necessary measures to look after themselves, rather than rely on the fall-back of feeling that Canada's universal health care system will mend all the harm their neglect of themselves will most certainly incur?
Seems not. The latest statistics available from Statistics Canada dating from 2004, revealing that 23.1% of Canadians are obese paints a startling landscape of laxity in self-involvement respecting personal health. That an additional 36% of Canadians are overweight, tells us that we're a society in dire need of a reality check. Overweight conditions, and most certainly obesity, lead directly to morbidity. Ensuring that these individuals are prime candidates for premature compromised health, often leading to death.
And yes, the health care system will do its best to apply band-aids to high blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease, prescribing all the necessary pharmaceuticals and protocols to help those afflicted stretch out their days on earth a little longer - often at the very great sacrifice of ease of life, and most certainly of pleasure in life. But is that really an adequate response? Shouldn't people be more aware, and be more aware of the impositions on the fragility of their physical conditions due to an overfed, sedentary lifestyle?
It's a choice to live like this, even though most people appear to experience difficulties in that direct attribution; selecting high-fat, high-sugar, high-salt edibles of convenience over nutritious and healthful food selections. And too much of any kind of food as well, far more than our bodies require to function properly. No one is ever too busy to exercise themselves, through the simple expedient of becoming more physical in their actions than to merely sit around and shovel food.
There are those in the public health field who are viewing the transformation of a healthy population into a prematurely aged and disease-ridden one with real alarm. Not only because of the waste of human potential, but additionally because of the very real burden on the public health care system. A system becoming too overburdened by the end effects of how people indulge themselves to the point of doing themselves real harm.
Without good health where's the enjoyment in life? It doesn't take a genius to realize that health impairment due to neglect - of exerting oneself to control food intake, to ensure adequate daily exercise becomes a part of one's daily life - is avoidable. The mental lassitude that leads to the casual shrug-off of personal responsibility says volumes about our collective sense of self-responsibility. And consider: this is the kind of attitude that is transferred to children.
No one in their right mind would choose to be in thrall to drugs. The simple fact is a drug regimen required to ensure that the body functions without collapse has its own dangers, because no pharmaceuticals taken on an ongoing basis are without risk. The side-effects of drugs taken to ease impaired health conditions are numerous, and often result in additional problems, sometimes just as serious as those they're taken to treat.
North American society - actually societies world-round, appear to be increasingly afflicted with the disease of dis-ease with taking personal responsibility for personal health outcomes. In the face of plenty we don't exercise a bare modicum of intelligence by rejecting over-abundance of intake, and the allure of couch-sitting and television-watching. Our unrestrained appetite to consume far more than we need for optimum health is our ruination.
Funnily enough, recent research appears to indicate that if people join weight-loss programs that encourage restraint and weight-loss by offering cash incentives, people respond positively. That's a pretty sad commentary.
Seems not. The latest statistics available from Statistics Canada dating from 2004, revealing that 23.1% of Canadians are obese paints a startling landscape of laxity in self-involvement respecting personal health. That an additional 36% of Canadians are overweight, tells us that we're a society in dire need of a reality check. Overweight conditions, and most certainly obesity, lead directly to morbidity. Ensuring that these individuals are prime candidates for premature compromised health, often leading to death.
And yes, the health care system will do its best to apply band-aids to high blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease, prescribing all the necessary pharmaceuticals and protocols to help those afflicted stretch out their days on earth a little longer - often at the very great sacrifice of ease of life, and most certainly of pleasure in life. But is that really an adequate response? Shouldn't people be more aware, and be more aware of the impositions on the fragility of their physical conditions due to an overfed, sedentary lifestyle?
It's a choice to live like this, even though most people appear to experience difficulties in that direct attribution; selecting high-fat, high-sugar, high-salt edibles of convenience over nutritious and healthful food selections. And too much of any kind of food as well, far more than our bodies require to function properly. No one is ever too busy to exercise themselves, through the simple expedient of becoming more physical in their actions than to merely sit around and shovel food.
There are those in the public health field who are viewing the transformation of a healthy population into a prematurely aged and disease-ridden one with real alarm. Not only because of the waste of human potential, but additionally because of the very real burden on the public health care system. A system becoming too overburdened by the end effects of how people indulge themselves to the point of doing themselves real harm.
Without good health where's the enjoyment in life? It doesn't take a genius to realize that health impairment due to neglect - of exerting oneself to control food intake, to ensure adequate daily exercise becomes a part of one's daily life - is avoidable. The mental lassitude that leads to the casual shrug-off of personal responsibility says volumes about our collective sense of self-responsibility. And consider: this is the kind of attitude that is transferred to children.
No one in their right mind would choose to be in thrall to drugs. The simple fact is a drug regimen required to ensure that the body functions without collapse has its own dangers, because no pharmaceuticals taken on an ongoing basis are without risk. The side-effects of drugs taken to ease impaired health conditions are numerous, and often result in additional problems, sometimes just as serious as those they're taken to treat.
North American society - actually societies world-round, appear to be increasingly afflicted with the disease of dis-ease with taking personal responsibility for personal health outcomes. In the face of plenty we don't exercise a bare modicum of intelligence by rejecting over-abundance of intake, and the allure of couch-sitting and television-watching. Our unrestrained appetite to consume far more than we need for optimum health is our ruination.
Funnily enough, recent research appears to indicate that if people join weight-loss programs that encourage restraint and weight-loss by offering cash incentives, people respond positively. That's a pretty sad commentary.
Labels: Environment, Health, Realities
posted by Pieface @ 5:38 PM
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