Life of Brian

WELCOME TO THE FUTURE AND IT SUCKS . . .US Live Expectancy Going Up and Down at the Same Time . . .. . . the healthcae gap is getting wider and it's killing women

Common understanding is that due to advanced in healthcare and technology and nuitrition, life expectancy has been rising.  Women tend to have a longer life expectancy than men.  A recent study on mortality rates by counties in the United States paints a very different - and rather depressing - picture.

The study by Majid Ezzati, Ari B. Friedman, Sandeep C. Kulkarni,  and Christopher J. L. Murray takes a hard look at actual county-by-county mortality data to uncover some disconcerting trends.  The PLos Medicine paper is The Reversal of Fortunes: Trends in County Mortality and Cross-County Mortality Disparities in the United States.  In the map above, you can compare mortality rates for men and women for the periods of 1961-1983 to those of 1983-1999.  The dark red areas are decreasing life expectancy while dark green areas are growing life expectancy.  Light red is below average but not decreasing and light green is above average but not increasing.  White areas are average.  Note the strong regional differences but also the nosedive in life expectancy for women.

The US is one of the most advanced nations on the planet but access to quality care is becoming limited  The cyberpunk dystopia is unfortunately becoming more and more increasingly accurate as a model for American society when it comes to access to healthcare.  Wealthier areas have always had more access to superior care and the gap between wealthy and the poor is widening as the middle class shrinks but also as many find their insurance  - if they can afford it - costs more and covers less.

The gap between male and female life expectancy is frightening as women naturally have higher expectancy but we are seeing a reveral.

What is causing the downturn?  For men, increased murder rates and HIV infections have has a real effect on life expectancy (but not for women).  Other culprits are factors for men and for women:

The researchers looked at differences in death rates between all counties in US states plus the District of Columbia over four decades, from 1961 to 1999. They obtained the data on number of deaths from the National Center for Health Statistics, and they obtained data on the number of people living in each county from the US Census. The NCHS did not provide death data after 2001. They broke the death rates down by sex and by disease to assess trends over time for women and men, and for different causes of death.

Over these four decades, the researchers found that the overall US life expectancy increased from 67 to 74 years of age for men and from 74 to 80 years for women. Between 1961 and 1983 the death rate fell in both men and women, largely due to reductions in deaths from cardiovascular disease (heart disease and stroke). During this same period, 1961-1983, the differences in death rates among/across different counties fell. However, beginning in the early 1980s the differences in death rates among/across different counties began to increase. The worst-off counties no longer experienced a fall in death rates, and in a substantial number of counties, mortality actually increased, especially for women, a shift that the researchers call "the reversal of fortunes." This stagnation in the worst-off counties was primarily caused by a slowdown or halt in the reduction of deaths from cardiovascular disease coupled with a moderate rise in a number of other diseases, such as lung cancer, chronic lung disease, and diabetes, in both men and women, and a rise in HIV/AIDS and homicide in men. The researchers' key finding, therefore, was that the differences in life expectancy across different counties initially narrowed and then widened.

This is scary stuff as the trends increase.  The folks at io9 offered their own take on the results:  So basically there is a growing health gap in the United States. Despite its status as a developed nation, the country is likely to harbor more and more communities where life expectancy is more like a developing nation. We're looking at a future where it's going to be increasingly difficult to say whether a country is "developing" or "developed" since it will exhibit characteristics of both.

Welcome to the future and it sucks.

All the best,
Brian

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China Celebrates Number One . . .

security guide to customs-proofing your laptop

Yep, what it says . . . security guide to customs-proofing your laptop . . . a lot of folks don't realize it but customs - particularly American customes - has begun copying the contents on laptop, cellphone, pda, and other devices for snooping. Yes, the entire contents, in many cases machines have been confiscated only to be returned weeks later but most are returned after a couple hours or so (enough time to copy everything).

Hong Kong schools close amid flu fears

It looks like another flu scare for Hong Kong . . . HK schools close amid flu fears . . . three children have died and five remain hospitalized while a number are showing symptoms. The closures are to keep the kids from spreading it. Scientists are trying to determine if the deaths were related or unrelated to the flu and to see if they can figure out if this thing is a new strain or something else.

Lorraine is going to Hong Kong for work next week so this news basically sucks (on this side of the planet, SARS really scared the bejeepers out of most of us - I was in maximum quarantine in hospital for a week with bronchitis when SARS hit and so have a particular reaction to anything that hints at more).

It is likely the new thing in HK is not an epidemic or anything like that but the government is also very sensitive to concerns and prefers to stay on the safe side.

All the best,
Brian

salvia divinorum set to go byebye . . . legally, that is

Well, it looks very likely that salvia divinorum, magick mint, is likely to go the way of marijuana and become a banned substance in most of the US . . . Ban for 'next marijuana'? . . . actually, I am suprised they didn't ban it earlier. Oh, by the way, the medical examiner who cited salvia divinorum as a contributing factor in the boy's death certainly didn't do so based upon the case, there was none in his system and it seems more likely other factors were far more contributory. No deaths have been found to be directly related to the drug . . . compare that to the legal drugs of nicotine and alcohol. Of course, marijuana is certainly not linked to actual deaths either so that won't stop salvia divinorum from being banned . . . it would be nice if they would cite the actual reasons for the ban though rather than cooking books or slanting reports.

All the best,
Brian

Zombie Plagues and Worse . . . . . . guess where the next real killer plague is coming from?

Okay, this kind of definately sucks . . . but . . . all those new movies and novels pretending to be science fiction that are about killer plagues wiping out humanity and worse . . . well, over the past fourty years, the number of new diseases and plague potentials have quadrupeled and it looks like it's only going to keep accellerating.  The map above is a prediction scale of areas where new plagues are likely to originate.  Red are the potential plague zones and green are areas less likely to originate killer diseases that wipe out humanity.  Guess what color I live in?

In the new study, researchers from four institutions analyzed 335 emerging diseases from 1940 to 2004, then converted the results into maps correlated with human population density, population changes, latitude, rainfall and wildlife biodiversity. They showed that disease emergences have roughly quadrupled over the past 50 years. Some 60% of the diseases traveled from animals to humans (such diseases are called zoonoses) and the majority of those came from wild creatures. With data corrected for lesser surveillance done in poorer countries, "hot spots" jump out in areas spanning sub-Saharan Africa, India and China; smaller spots appear in Europe, and North and South America.

"We are crowding wildlife into ever-smaller areas, and human population is increasing," said coauthor Marc Levy, a global-change expert at the Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN), an affiliate of Columbia University's Earth Institute. "The meeting of these two things is a recipe for something crossing over." The main sources are mammals. Some pathogens may be picked up by hunting or accidental contact; others, such as Malaysia's Nipah virus, go from wildlife to livestock, then to people. Humans have evolved no resistance to zoonoses, so the diseases can be extraordinarily lethal.

Definately sucks.  Our world health resources tend to be concentrated in the areas with the least potential for problems . . . the red areas tend to have the least resources and the least sensible monitoring.  Back when Taiwan got hit by the SARS panic, I was one of the folks who was quarantined in hospital as a possible victim (no, I did not have SARS but I did have enough common symptoms to be a supected case - a week of fear in a scary isolation room was not a happy time) so this is not cheerful news.

How It All Ends

Watch more of Greg's videos on youtube - http://www.youtube.com/wonderingmind42 - and notice how he uses influence masterfully.

All the best,
Brian

Hungry?

Lunch anyone? Giant rat discovered in Indonesia jungle.

Well, Special Interests Get Their Way . . . no shocker there

Yep . . . "defied law, science and common sense" . . . but the autobuddies to the administration do indeed get their cake and eat it too . . . E.P.A. Says 17 States Can’t Set Emission Rules for Cars. Kudos to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger for vowing to fight this ruling and sue the federal government on this thing.

Sedition and Treason in Bridge?

Tecnically, in American law, it is neither sedition nor treason to voice one's opinion that you disagree with a president or that you did not vote for that president . . . evidently it is in bridge . . . poor taste or not is a different question . . . certainly, the contoversy is more than it should be . . . see here.