Preventive medicine

Thousands of you will have, or did have, a hard time getting to work this morning ? hard breathing, hard sweating, hard helmets.

Today is the 35th annual Bike to Work Day. about 4,000 Boulder participants had signed up, although organizers (and our eyeballs) attest to the belief that many more people participate than sign up. Close to 50 breakfast stations will serve the morning commuters.

So it?s sweaty and social. Two of the things most locals either love about Boulder, or love to have a laugh about.

But physical fitness is a key component to preventive health and it is no laughing matter. Granted ?physical fitness? does not necessarily mean cycling fast and furious from your home in Nederland or Erie to your job on Pearl Street, and if you did that today, you probably don?t suffer from a lack of physical exertion. but since it is a day that celebrates exercise ? along with cost savings, community participation and environmental stewardship ? it?s a nice day to reflect on public health and preventative care.

Last week, U.S. Surgeon General Regina Benjamin said that health care in America needs a paradigm shift, to a focus on disease prevention instead of on the treatment of illness.

?Our goal really is to improve the health and well-being of all Americans,? she said. ?We can?t just pay attention to what happens in the doctor?s office. It?s the air we breathe and the food we eat. we can provide clear and simple information based on the latest science and research so people can make the best decisions for their families.?

A big component of this is healthy eating, but she emphasized that exercise ? playing, being physically active ? is, too.

Who knows if she can have an impact. Experts have been warning about the obesity epidemic for years, and it?s getting worse, not better. Here?s hoping that we may have reached a tipping point where public health advocates can win the war against unhealthy diets and sedentary lifestyles. Anti-smoking advocates were able to make significant strides against smoking in public and the risks it posed, particularly in the workplace. we need a similar shift when it comes to diet and exercise.

The life expectancy of American women has actually been sliding in many regions of the country. The worst-performing counties were concentrated in Appalachia, the Deep South and the lower Midwest. it started in 1997, but researchers say it accelerated in the last decade. It?s a reversal of a century-long trend. The last time there was this notable of a decline was in 1918, due to the Spanish flu epidemic.

Researchers for the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington say this time, smoking and obesity are to blame. And where efforts to reduce smoking have worked, they?ve been replaced by obesity.

If anything, a major public health initiative that focuses on eating healthy and physical fitness is a much cheaper approach health care than treating diseases in hospitals. but more importantly, it could save (and dramatically improve) lives.

? Erika Stutzman, for

the Camera editorial board

Tags: community participation, Social Issues, Hospitality Recreation, Health Medical Pharma
This entry was posted on Friday, June 24th, 2011 at 9:25 pm and is filed under Medicine. You can follow any comments to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a comment. Pinging is currently not allowed.

Source: http://kdlepenica.com/medicine/preventive-medicine/

conan o brien siri san antonio bacon alyson hannigan timberland jennifer love hewitt