This graph shows how much people are willing to pay for health insurance (It seems to fit about what I’ve seen in the comments at sites advocating single payer health care system.)
I’ve just about had it with people earning 80K+ a year who “can’t afford” health insurance (another NPR interview).
Graph courtesy of NPR: Few Uninsured Willing To Pay Full Cost For Coverage
There’s a lot to be said for Rammesh Ponnoru’s essay, “The Misguided Quest for Universal Coverage“. The big take away:
To mandate that everyone purchase health insurance, as many have suggested, would require that the government specify what constitutes adequate coverage — in other words, what health conditions an insurance policy would need to cover. Every provider group with a lobbyist, from massage therapists to fertility specialists, would want in. The result would be expensive insurance policies and costly government subsidies to help people buy them.
Several articles I’ve read lately (and listened to on NPR) have pointed to the role of inflammation in cardiovascular disease.
Before your doctor tries to put you on statins, or recommends invasive procedures I would highly recommend getting tested for C-Reactive Protein (inflammation factor). Also see this link for a nice little heart disease risk calculator–read the entry and you’ll see why its very important to calculate ALL your numbers.
Try this handy little heart disease calculator. Especially if your doctor wants to put you on statins, or perform an unnecessary laprascopy on you…
My cholesterol, dear readers, is 280. But my HDL is 85, and I don’t have blood pressure to speak of (when I’m extra nervous it shoots up to 90/50). So my risk is less than 1%.
Well, maybe. I can’t find a place that says it needs to be taken with a fat of some sort. The D supplements I took this winter were not in fish oil, I wonder if that is why they didn’t work? Or if its hogwash!
Lethal Secrets of Spanish Flu Revealed
“This study in macaques, combined with our earlier research showing the host response in mice infected with the 1918 flu, suggests that the host immune response is out of control in animals infected with the virus.”
So how do we “turn off” this immune response? My experiments with Vitamin D did nothing to quell my symptoms of flu this winter…of course it did work LAST winter…maybe I got a bad batch? Or maybe taking megadoses of Vitamin D to ward off elevated immune response is hogwash?