We're Fat, Stressed and Awaiting a Heart Attack -- and We're 16th Overall in the World
We knew we were fat, stressed and on the verge of a heart attack. But did you know that, globally, we're 112 out of 122 on the obesity scale?
That's according to The World Economic Forum, as reported by The Washington Post.
Every year this group meets to discuss the state of the world, and here's where we come in on education (11th), health and wellness (43rd out of 44; we're only trailed by Qatar), enabling the environment (16th) and overall (16th).
Pretty depressing, huh?
The disappointing overall score, according to The Washington Post, is for our health score, and that's mostly because of our increasing rates of obesity, diabetes and cardiac disease. The "business impact of disease overall?" We clock in at 65th.
"In the proud tradition of think tank indices, small, homogenous European nations generally do best – them and Singapore – while large, diverse developed nations generally come next, with an occasional outlier like Qatar that has a lot of money and a reasonably progressive royal family," notes The Post. The rest of the world falls toward the bottom in random array.
Yemen comes last.
So what does this say about us? You'd think living in a country this developed and advanced, we'd be the first in everything. But I watched a recent YouTube segment on why our healthcare is the world's most expensive -- and least effective -- that was very sobering, and depressing. There's a whole rank of factors why -- malpractice (though that's not as much of the cost as you'd think; over-diagnosising; over-testing, and probably the biggest reason of all, we don't negotiate with medical equipment suppliers and pharmaceutical companies like Britain, which basically sends out an RFP for hip replacement parts, for example, and takes the lowest bid).
We all know the story. Exercise daily. Eat less. Eat better. And maybe we can't affect our place in the world re:healthcare, but we certainly can affect our own.
That's according to The World Economic Forum, as reported by The Washington Post.
Every year this group meets to discuss the state of the world, and here's where we come in on education (11th), health and wellness (43rd out of 44; we're only trailed by Qatar), enabling the environment (16th) and overall (16th).
Pretty depressing, huh?
The disappointing overall score, according to The Washington Post, is for our health score, and that's mostly because of our increasing rates of obesity, diabetes and cardiac disease. The "business impact of disease overall?" We clock in at 65th.
"In the proud tradition of think tank indices, small, homogenous European nations generally do best – them and Singapore – while large, diverse developed nations generally come next, with an occasional outlier like Qatar that has a lot of money and a reasonably progressive royal family," notes The Post. The rest of the world falls toward the bottom in random array.
Yemen comes last.
So what does this say about us? You'd think living in a country this developed and advanced, we'd be the first in everything. But I watched a recent YouTube segment on why our healthcare is the world's most expensive -- and least effective -- that was very sobering, and depressing. There's a whole rank of factors why -- malpractice (though that's not as much of the cost as you'd think; over-diagnosising; over-testing, and probably the biggest reason of all, we don't negotiate with medical equipment suppliers and pharmaceutical companies like Britain, which basically sends out an RFP for hip replacement parts, for example, and takes the lowest bid).
We all know the story. Exercise daily. Eat less. Eat better. And maybe we can't affect our place in the world re:healthcare, but we certainly can affect our own.
Comments
Post a Comment