How healthy is the US?

With a historic health care bill being debated today (3/21/2010) as I write this I wanted to mention a few things about where the United States stands in terms of health care. Facts in this article are mostly from: http://www.americashealthrankings.org/.

The US currently spends more per person than any other country. Yet we rank about 30th among other countries in the world when measured on life expectancy from birth. US life expectancy is about 70 years while the #1 nation, Japan, is 76. It looks like the most important factor is the infant mortality rate which is about 6/1000 in the US vs. 3 or less for most of the higher ranking countries. Old age infections and poor child well being (when compared to other rich countries) also are important factors which can be inexpensively remedied.

There is a large gap between healthy and unhealthy states. The healthiest states are Hawaii, Utah and 3 New England states: Vermont (#1), Massachusetts and New Hampshire. The sickest are mostly southern states: South Carolina, Louisiana, Alabama, Oklahoma and Mississippi. The biggest two factors are rate of smoking and rate of obesity which are 22% and 33% respectively in the worst state Mississippi.
The state rankings have no correlation to spending with Hawaii providing the most at $220/person and New Hampshire the least at $59/person and Utah close behind at $60 both less than any of the 5 unhealthiest states.

In addition to smoking and obesity there is a strong correlation to number of people with insurance. We hope a health care bill moves forward today. Making health care available to 30 million additional Americans should go a long way to improving health care in America. We don't have answers to questions about costs but if 30 other countries can top the US in life expectancy for less cost there must be some answers out there.

bon appetit!
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Read the full article and lose weight with us at: Diet Inn

Go Easy on the Vitamins & Supplements

The best way to get nutrition is from eating balanced and varied meals. One can't always eat perfectly though, especially if dramatically reducing food input which happens with some diets. Some vitamins are not readily available in foods.

A multi-vitamin pill seems a cheap insurance policy. Mega doses of vitamins can be harmful and if not harmful are wasted money. So we recommend a basic multi-vitamin that contains 100% of the US recommendations.

Too much vitamin A can be harmful. Many people don't get anough vitamin D. D is produced by our skin when exposed to sunshine. People who live in the high latitudes likely don't get enough sun in winter to produce the optimal amount of D. Elsewhere people use sun screen to block the sun reducing skin cancer risk. There are studies suggesting the minimum recommendation of D is too low.

Don't take two multi-vitamins to get more D! That could mean taking too much of another vitamin. Try to get outside. Walking is good for you in many ways. If it isn't too cold you can expose some skin to the sun.

Fish oil is an excellent source of omega-3 fatty acids. Omega-3s are beneficial for heart health among other things. Many people, especially those who don't eat fish, don't get enough. Fish oil soft gels or even spoonfuls of cod liver oil are a helpful suplement and a good idea for almost everybody. Fish oil contains some vitamin A and some D.

Women may take calcium supplements. Vitamin D is required by the body to metabolize the calcium. Any calcium supplement should also contain D. Take 1 with a meal. If your doctor wants you to take more than it is best to spread them out so taking one with each meal is better than taking two at the same time.

So there you have it. In our opinion almost everyone can take one regular multi-vitamin daily. People who eat fewer than 4 (or so) servings of fish weekly should take fish oil soft gels daily. Women should take a calcium (with D) supplement daily.

bon appetit!
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Read the full article and lose weight with us at: Diet Inn

Go Vegetarian - Save the World?

We recently spent some time with some Vegans. They were morally opposed to eating animal products of any sort. It is Lent which is a time when Catholics don't eat meat on Fridays and perhaps other days. Another fellow who is extremely concerned about the environment claims eating less beef will save the Earth's ecosystem. A financial adviser says eating less meat will save us money. From our point of view we see that meat has high levels of cholesterol and saturated fat which are bad for your health and weight.

With all these very different people and their very different arguments telling us we need to write about eating less meat we agreed to think about it. It didn't take much thought to concur. Regular Diet Inn readers know we advocate diversity in diet. Generally speaking too much or too little of any particular thing can be problematic.

Portions of meat served in restaurants are too large, often obscenely large. Three ounces of meat is a good amount. That is a piece of meat the size of a deck of playing cards. It is smaller than those quarter pounders at the fast food joints. One way of reducing your meat consumption is to serve smaller portions.

Meat has lots of nutrients; there are no better sources of protein. While we don't advocate totally giving up meat vegetarianism does work for some people. It is harder to ensure you have a good, balanced, nutritious diet. If you totally give up meat please fully research your nutrition needs and how your new diet will satisfy them.

We suggest adopting a vegetarian diet 1 day a week. We also suggest giving up meat at least 6 breakfasts a week and consuming minimal meat at lunchtime. Most people should eat at least 2 servings of fish weekly to get the minimum helpful amount of omega-3. Poultry is inexpensive and has less saturated fat than red meat especially if you remove the skin. We pencil in two poultry dinners a week. If you eat 1 beef or pork, 2 poultry, 2 fish and 1 veggie dinner a week that leaves one other meal free for whatever you like best.

Follow the above advice and you will not only eat much less beef than the average American but will have more variety and a healthier diet.

bon appetit!
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Read the full article and lose weight with us at: Diet Inn