[Pops]

I moved some of the ACA specific stuff to the ocare thread...

[AgentR11]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', 'I')f you have no health insurance isn't that the time to watch your diet, exercise regularly, and avoid high risk behavior like drugs? I swear I don't understand my own species sometimes.

[Plantagenet]

The main reason for the rising death rate in working class middle aged whites is the increase in drug poisonings associated with prescription opiates and illegal drugs. I showed this when I linked to the original paper published in PNAC back on the first page of this thread.

The rest of the discussion in this thread has been mainly about possible causes for the observed increase in drug use and the rising death rate. The discussion has mostly focussed on what is called the "no money no honey" hypothesis, ie. that working class whites have suffered loss of income and status since things like the collapse of US unions and the NAFTA treaty and mass immigration combined to wipe out most high paying US jobs for working class whites.

One things we've been missing in our discussion here is that there hasn't been a similar increase in the death rate for working class whites in the EU. There is some important difference between the EU and the US is responsible for the death rate going up in the US and not in the EU. What is that difference? Why the higher death rate in the USA?

The most likely difference is that the healthcare system is better the EU then in the USA because they have single-payer care in the EU. When you've got a population with medical issues and they don't go to the doctor, then some of them are going to die. The lack of single-payer medical coverage in the US means that many low income people aren't covered by medical insurance, or even if they are the deductibles are so high that put off going to the doctor because the insurance doesn't kick in until the huge deductible is covered by the patient.

I suggest that the high cost of getting health care in the US is one of the reasons the death rate for middle aged white Americans is going up.

[Cog]

The boomers, like myself, also grew up in a era where processed food was the norm, driving instead of walking, and the stress of living in a modern society is prevalent.Although most people don't notice it, living in a high technology world is stressful although it is convenient. If you look at pictures of Depression era and before, people were not obese and lived fairly active life styles. Their life-span wasn't as long but they were fairly healthy until the died.

[PrestonSturges]

Well the next generations are going to be a lot worse off. I drove through the neighborhood the other day and saw a couple adolescent kids tossing a football, and I thought how rare it was to see young teens outside playing.

[Lore]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PrestonSturges', 'W')ell the next generations are going to be a lot worse off. I drove through the neighborhood the other day and saw a couple adolescent kids tossing a football, and I thought how rare it was to see young teens outside playing.

[Shaved Monkey]

Its not all bad news in the future.
You would need the junk food industry to go bust and the increase in backyard veggie patches though
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he Great Depression had a silver lining: During that hard time, U.S. life expectancy increased by 6.2 years, researchers say.

Life expectancy rose from 57.1 in 1929 to 63.3 years in 1932, according to the analysis by U-M researchers José A. Tapia Granados and Ana Diez Roux. The increase occurred for both men and women, and for whites and non-whites.

[Newfie]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', 'T')he boomers, like myself, also grew up in a era where processed food was the norm, driving instead of walking, and the stress of living in a modern society is prevalent.Although most people don't notice it, living in a high technology world is stressful although it is convenient. If you look at pictures of Depression era and before, people were not obese and lived fairly active life styles. Their life-span wasn't as long but they were fairly healthy until the died.

[onlooker]

"Just been around so many people, so many strangers, so many god damn fire engines, and ambulances, and other alarms stresses me out." Living all my life near NY city I can certainly attest to all this. That is why I am happier living now in upstate NY, less people, less noise etc.

[Keith_McClary]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', 'A')nd the ex-governor who was a Democrat and Obama the Democrat did so very much for those poor people. Maybe they are voting Republican because they are sick of the Dem policies that landed them in a bad spot.

[Revi]

Certainly something is causing middle aged Americans to die at a higher rate. I would say the sedentary lifestyle hasn't helped any. Hard to tell what would be the solution to it, but I'm pretty sure that in a couple of generations there won't be a sedentary life style except for the super rich.

[Newfie]

We have had a bald eagle hanging around near the boat for a few days, that's rejuvenating.

But now I'm back in the city for a work week. Shit!

[Revi]

Thanks to your inspiration we are thinking of getting a small sailboat as well Newfie.
I think it will be the ideal bug out vehicle if things get dicey. We are looing at a Cape Dory Typhoon. It's small, but seaworthy.

[Newfie]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'T')hanks to your inspiration we are thinking of getting a small sailboat as well Newfie.
I think it will be the ideal bug out vehicle if things get dicey. We are looing at a Cape Dory Typhoon. It's small, but seaworthy.

[PrestonSturges]

Most vulnerable Kentucky voters signing their own death warrants
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')Kentucky counties with highest Medicaid rates backed Matt Bevin, who plans to cut Medicaid

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-g ... rylink=cpy
BOONEVILLE — The 66 percent of Owsley County that gets health coverage through Medicaid now must reconcile itself with the 70 percent that voted for Republican Governor-elect Matt Bevin, who pledged to cut the state's Medicaid program and close the state-run Kynect health insurance exchange.
Lisa Botner, 36, belongs to both camps. A Kynector — a state agent representing Kynect in the field — recently helped Botner sign up for a Wellcare Medicaid card for herself and her 7-year-old son. Without that, Botner said, she couldn't afford the regular doctor's visits and blood tests needed to keep her hyperthyroidism in check.

"If anything changed with our insurance to make it more expensive for us, that would be a big problem," Botner, a community college student, said Friday at the Owsley County Public Library, where she works. "Just with the blood tests, you're talking maybe $1,000 a year without insurance."

Yet two weeks earlier, despite his much-discussed plans to repeal Kynect and toughen eligibility requirements for Medicaid, she voted for Bevin.

"I'm just a die-hard Republican," she said.

[Newfie]

Natural selection in action?

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'N')atural selection in action?

[PrestonSturges]

As I said in another thread, the rural hospitals are closing because of their high non payment rate.

At some point we should see the return of rampant syphilis and TB, maybe even some grotesque parasitic diseases.

Now if they could just withdraw from the Tennessee Valley Authority and go back to dirt roads and candle light.

[kuidaskassikaeb]

A somebody who lives in a county with 2 hospitals, neither of which has a doctor (they use NPs and PAs), I think that non payment is not the problem. Basically they can't keep the beds full. Medicare and medicade don't like to pay for hospital stays and people sick enough just go to the city. Hornell had 3 hospitals 25 years ago now they got none.

[Cog]

most state constitutions have requirement that there exists a balanced budget. the Kentucky governor is making sure that that is an achievable goal. Medicaid costs fall on the state after some period of time when Obamacare came into existence. I see nothing wrong with his prudent decision to throw people off of it