Mar 31, 2023·edited Mar 31, 2023Liked by Nancy, Alison, Marion
Yes, toxic materials are indeed proliferating in our environment, and have been for at least 200 years. One thinks about the poor children exposed to lead from water pipes and paint, or even worse, working on bleak hills to sort and wash the lead ore coming from the mines, or breathing in soot from cleaning chimneys. Or the little match girls exposed to phosphorous .
Or just kids like me born in the 1950's in urban Britain, living in dense smogs of part-burned petrochemicals from coal burning, and breathing in lead from petrol fumes.
What's the good news? Well, life expectancy has doubled since 1945, so we aren't dying at those high rates. Clean air acts, control of water and food quality, lots of positives.
hey, we even get a bath more than once a week, and don't have to share the filthy bathwater with our older siblings or dad!
What's the bed news? A massive increase in Autism, for reasons that we can only speculate about.
If there was a proven link to a specific toxin, we would have found it by now.
And an horrific increase in obesity.
Plenty of challenges ahead, but keeping an open mind, and ensuring that science is unbiased by commercial interests, are the best means of improvement.
Thank you, Bob, for commenting... we still have work to do on building readership and getting comments going. Yes, science needs to be unbiased. Yes, life spans have improved. Parsing out the nuanced reality is not easy, although we will attempt some of it with future posts. Ones that include what science has been able to prove, and American courts are accepting for holding corporate interests accountable. America is an interesting and challenging place to be in these days. Yet among all our billionaires and technologists, there are still folks who value mushrooms and beautiful skies. Appreciate your substack.
life expectancy has increased but as a nurse, my personal observation is that a more accurate description is we are dying longer. Lifespan interests me less than Healthspan, which is something that is often not part of the conversation in medicine/healthcare
Yes, toxic materials are indeed proliferating in our environment, and have been for at least 200 years. One thinks about the poor children exposed to lead from water pipes and paint, or even worse, working on bleak hills to sort and wash the lead ore coming from the mines, or breathing in soot from cleaning chimneys. Or the little match girls exposed to phosphorous .
Or just kids like me born in the 1950's in urban Britain, living in dense smogs of part-burned petrochemicals from coal burning, and breathing in lead from petrol fumes.
What's the good news? Well, life expectancy has doubled since 1945, so we aren't dying at those high rates. Clean air acts, control of water and food quality, lots of positives.
hey, we even get a bath more than once a week, and don't have to share the filthy bathwater with our older siblings or dad!
What's the bed news? A massive increase in Autism, for reasons that we can only speculate about.
If there was a proven link to a specific toxin, we would have found it by now.
And an horrific increase in obesity.
Plenty of challenges ahead, but keeping an open mind, and ensuring that science is unbiased by commercial interests, are the best means of improvement.
Thank you, Bob, for commenting... we still have work to do on building readership and getting comments going. Yes, science needs to be unbiased. Yes, life spans have improved. Parsing out the nuanced reality is not easy, although we will attempt some of it with future posts. Ones that include what science has been able to prove, and American courts are accepting for holding corporate interests accountable. America is an interesting and challenging place to be in these days. Yet among all our billionaires and technologists, there are still folks who value mushrooms and beautiful skies. Appreciate your substack.
life expectancy has increased but as a nurse, my personal observation is that a more accurate description is we are dying longer. Lifespan interests me less than Healthspan, which is something that is often not part of the conversation in medicine/healthcare
We agree...'healthspan' is so needed (and yet neglected) in medicine today.