DECEMBER 15, 2008

Apparently I’m a little behind, but I recently learned that a few weeks ago, the Supreme Court of Canada decided to uphold the “one-person, one-fare” airline policy for persons “functionally disabled by obesity.” The policy entitles clinically obese people to occupy two seats if they cannot fit into just one, for the same price.  

Canada is the first, and only, country in the world to force its airlines to follow this type of policy, which actually surprises me. Considering that one in three Americans are obese, you’d expect that this issue would have already been addressed in our courts.  That said, just because there hasn’t been caselaw on it yet, doesn’t mean there hasn’t been talk of it.  In fact, this past summer, Newsweek ran an article that questioned whether or not “fat people” should have to pay more for their tickets, because a study concluded that the 10 pounds Americans gained on average during the 1990s required an additional 350 million gallons of fuel a year. 

As it stands, the U.S. spends $33 billion dollars a year on services for the obese, so the question is: as Americans steadily grow larger in size, what will our government do?  What should it do?  Will the courts interfere, forcing airlines to uphold the “one-person, one-fare’ policy, and eat the additional costs associated with it or will Americans be forced to downsize if they want to fly?   

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DECEMBER 10, 2008

My name is Krissy and I’m a cyberchondriac.

In the 7th grade, my friend, Adrienne, went to the hospital for stomach pains and found out she had a tumor the size of a football lurking in her stomach. In college, another friend (who also happened to be in the same 7th grade class as Adrienne and me) got lymph node cancer that was detected only because she went to see her doctor for something completely unrelated. And as if this situation weren’t rare enough– having 2 friends who were diagnosed with cancer at young ages– yet another friend of mine (an active and healthy non-smoker) just found out she has stage 4 lung cancer that has spread to her brain. All of these experiences have caused me to be abnormally fearful of getting cancer (amongst other diseases), believing that it’s not so rare after all. It’s no wonder that I’ve turned into a “cyberchondriac.”

What exactly is a “cyberchondriac”? Well, it’s a new term that’s emerging as more and more people are turning to sites like WebMD to diagnose their own illnesses. The definition is an “individual who use[s] the Internet to gather information on health or healthcare, for themselves or people in their care.” I, like more than 160 million others, visit medical sites when I get the sniffles or have random aches and pains, and, admittedly, I usually end up diagnosing myself with some sort of rare disease or, worst of all, cancer.

Recently, in an attempt to conquer my fear of cancer, I decided to do some actual research on the risks associated with it. According to a November 26th article in The Washington Post, the pace at which Americans are getting cancer has actually begun to decline. Cancer deaths have also been on the decline that started in the early 90s. For the first time ever, both trend lines are dropping!  I was both shocked and relieved to learn this news; nowadays, I think most of us believe the risks for illnesses are much greater than they actually are (no thanks to media hype). However, hile I’m glad to know that cancer diagnoses are falling, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t still a little fearful of the risk.

Regardless, New Year’s Resolution 2009: try to cut back on the self-diagnosing of ailments. After all, as much as I like to think I’m an expert in everything, I’m just not. I need to learn to leave the diagnosing to those who actually went to medical school!

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NOVEMBER 19, 2008

I was reading an publication from EPM Communications on consumer behavior and attitudes when I saw a statistic that made me unsure as to whether I should laugh out loud or cry. Here it is: A third of Americans (34%) exercise 100 or more days a year; 10% exercise 50-99 days a year; and 15% are opposed to regular exercise.

Opposed to regular exercise? What?! Why would someone say that they are opposed to regular exercise? Do these people choose to ignore the fact that as much as 64% of the U.S. population is overweight? Being overweight has been identified as a cause of cancer, diabetes, heart problems, and sleep apnea, and has been found to reduce life expectancy. Why would someone identify themselves as being against exercising?

Maybe it’s because we hear so many conflicting headlines about just how bad it is to carry extra weight on our frames. One week we hear that it’s not as bad as we previously had thought… the next week we hear that a little extra weight may be good for our bone density numbers… a week later we hear that we should lose the weight in order to stay healthy and live long lives.

As a result, it seems that we are increasingly choosing to believe exactly what we want to believe and, therefore, dangerously ignoring the rest of the facts. Does hearing these vastly different perspectives on a daily basis provide exactly the excuse we need to be lazy? We like to believe that we have good genes, that we were athletes in high school and can get back into shape whenever we want.  We also believe that we are healthy because, even though the scale is showing us a number higher than we want to see, our blood pressure and cholesterol numbers are normal. As a society, we complain about health insurance costs but isn’t it our lack of self-control and/or denial contributing to the problem?

Perhaps we should all make the time to filter through the saturation of headlines and conflicting studies and educate ourselves on the risks associated with our unhealthy habits - individually, as well as for our nation as a whole. How’s that for a New Year’s resolution?

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NOVEMBER 17, 2008

I’ll admit it - when it comes to health news, I tend to fixate on the negative instead of the positive.  I worry about the germs or the .0000001% chance that I’ll develop a disease from some chemical I’ve been exposed to, rather than celebrate all the advancements that have been made in medicine over the years.

However, recently, a few articles have forced me to focus on the positive.  First, there was an announcement about how targeting cancer treatments to a patient’s specific genes offers extraordinary hope for personalized cures.  Another study further proved that statins are a tremendously powerful shield against heart attack and stroke.  (A friend re-affirmed the importance of this news the other night by mentioning a leading heart surgeon they knew personally who raved about the life-saving ability of statins.)  Then there was the 60 Minutes story on someone who could use their brain to convey thoughts directly to  a computer.  And finally, a piece that profiled the Kanzius machine which - if clinical trials prove successful - will zap cancer cells all through your body without the need for drugs or surgery and without side effects.

All reasons to feel hopeful, right?  Yet it seems as a nation, we still seem to cling to ungrounded fears about risk and disease more than we celebrate medical breakthroughs.  Perhaps it’s because we’ve lost trust in institutions as a whole, the medical industry being no exception.  We feel we’ve been lied to, manipulated, and let down, so no information can be “good” or trusted.  We’re so saturated with conflicting information that we don’t know what to trust anymore, and that confusion paralyzes us and makes us fearful.

While I recognize this tendency in my own life, I am going to make an effort to change my habits.  We live in an era of unprecedented innovation in medicine - will you join me in being excited about it?

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NOVEMBER 14, 2008

Today is World Diabetes Day – a day to draw attention to the grave threat posed by diabetes. Our boss Dan McGinn has kept a close eye on rising diabetes rates for several years and he often mentions it as one of the biggest threats facing the U.S. We thought it would be appropriate today to link to an article he wrote recently for our website:

I have spent my life engaging with people, trying to see what lies ahead, analyzing what matters to Americans and understanding risks and how we perceive them. It seems to me that we have lost sight of the things that should be of serious concern to us. We are continually bombarded with reasons to be afraid and things to look out for and have reached a saturation point. We no longer put our risks in perspective. What we need to be aware of is that the top risk factor for diabetes is obesity. One third of Americans are obese. Almost one in five children is overweight. Obesity is a problem that we can do something about. Experts say that half of Type 2 diabetes cases can be prevented. And half of today’s cases are still more than the total number of people who had diabetes twenty five years ago.

Go here to read Dan’s thoughts in their entirety.

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OCTOBER 22, 2008

People seem to be most concerned about two things right now - the economy and the upcoming election.  But what many don’t realize is that both could be risky to their health.

For instance, did you know that there are more traffic-related deaths on presidential election days than on the day of the Super Bowl, according to a recent report in The Journal of the American Medical Association? Using a national database, the study counted the number of driving deaths on every presidential election day from 1976 to 2004.  An average of 158 people died in crashes each election day, compared with 134 crashes on the Tuesdays before.

Why? It is hard to say, but clearly there are more people on the road, and they may be distracted looking around to find their polling place.  This increase in car deaths could be even more significant in a heavy turnout year like this one. Researchers recommend that get-out-the-vote campaigners emphasize safe driving tips when urging people to vote.

Second, the ailing economy may be causing fewer visits to doctors.  A recent survey found that more than 80 million Americans - insured or not - are cutting back on their health care to save money. Another survey shows that young adults that have been hit the hardest. Nearly 70 percent say the downturn has made it more difficult in the last year to pay for medical expenses.

Even though skimping on health care can have serious consequences, it’s hard for folks in tough economic times to think long term. Unless a risk is imminent or high, we tend to roll the dice and hope for the best.  It is even more clear why this election is so focused on the need for health care reform in this country.

So, putting risk into perspective, it is important to be aware of how major events on the national stage can trickle down to impact us. We can then take steps to minimize the risks they may impose, like driving more carefully to the polls or sticking with our medical checkups even when our pocketbooks are tight. At least that gives us some control in this topsy-turvy world.

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OCTOBER 9, 2008

WARNING!  Your computer has been infected with a Trojan virus.  Critical files could be lost.  Click HERE to download an anti-virus program that will fix your system!

This is just one of a slew of pop-up warnings that spyware and malware creators use to try to mislead unsuspecting Internet users into downloading potentially harmful software.

A new study by researchers at North Carolina State University shows that most Internet users are still unable to distinguish genuine pop-up warnings from fake ones – even after repeated mistakes.  (Is there a Pavlov in the house?)

The study examined the responses of undergraduate students to real and fake warning messages while they conducted a series of Internet searches on a personal computer.   The real warning messages simulated local Windows operating system warnings, whereas the fake messages were from an external source and designed to trick users into downloading a harmful virus or malicious software.

Participants were fooled by the fake messages 63 percent of the time, hitting the “OK” button in the message box when it appeared on the screen despite being told that some of what they would be seeing would be fake.

“This study demonstrates how easy it is to fool people on the Web,” says study co-author Dr. Michael S. Wogalter, professor of psychology at NC State.

Most telling of all, however, was that, after interviewing the participants, researchers found that the students were so eager to get the pop-up boxes out of the way that they clicked right through obvious warning signs.  In other words, after being saturated by so many advertisements and marketing tools, the students had become too desensitized to notice the actual risks - and perhaps even the benefits - associated with the ads.

You should know that the most prevalent scareware program in circulation today is called Antivirus XP 2008.  Often installed on a PC without proper notification, the software bombards victims with fake security warnings, trying to convince them to buy worthless programs that sometimes even harm their PCs.

The good news is that Microsoft is working with the state of Washington to sue companies that exploit Windows to deliver these misleading popups.  Microsoft, after all, has a strong incentive to curtail spyware: about 50% of its customer-support calls come from spyware-related crashes.  A few times a year, I too am forced to spend an uncomfortable evening resolving a spyware problem.  What about you?

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AUGUST 8, 2008

I listened to an interesting interview on the Diane Rehm show this week.  Her guest was Dan Gardner, Ottawa Citizen columnist and author of the recently released book The Science Of Fear.

If you have read any of my other posts, you know that I like to write about putting risks in perspective and why we worry about the wrong things.  So, I couldn’t have been any happier to take an hour out of my day to listen to Gardner’s interview.  His overarching message was music to my ears.  During his interview he talked extensively about our “risk society” and why we are increasingly preoccupied with threats to health and safety.

Gardner made the point that while we sense more fear than prior generations, we are actually the safest and healthiest people that ever lived.  Although, as he acknowledges, the fear point may be a great generalization, the fact of our improved health and safety today is not.  He cited our increased life expectancy as proof.  But, you can also look at many other factors to support the statement.  Take for example cancer and heart disease.  As noted in one of my blog posts from earlier this year death rates from these causes have been dropping, yet we’re worrying more.

He also make a very interesting point about “intuitive toxicology,” a term he says was coined by Paul Slovic and essentially means that our gut reaction tells us to think that “there’s no safe level.”  Gardner explains that just because it’s there, doesn’t mean it’s harmful.  Measurement technology has improved so much over the last several years that we are able to detect contaminants down to parts per trillion levels.  Parts per trillion?  To give you some context on that, one part per trillion equates to 1 second in 320 centuries or 1 cent to $10 billion.  I agree with Gardner’s point that just because it’s there doesn’t necessarily mean it’s harmful and I think this is a great example of the need to put risks in perspective.  Should we really spend time worrying about a part per trillion of a substance in our water?

Gardner attributes the fact that we often get risks wrong to three factors – media, fear marketers and psychology.  For example, he says the media (himself included) do a terrible job of reporting on risk because the media “routinely reports on the rare, and rarely reports on the routine.”  He also says that so called “fear marketers” such as organizations that profit from fear and politicians perpetuate risk and fuel our worry.  Finally, he says psychology also plays a role in all of this.

As you can imagine, I agree on all points to varying degrees and I think he makes a strong argument for why we worry about the wrong things.  What do you think?

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JULY 25, 2008

While skimming one of my favorite blogs, YumSugar, I learned that Monday was National Junk Food Day.  I didn’t even know that there was a day dedicated just to junk food, because it seems like every day is a junk food day for many Americans. “The number of people who are overweight or obese has sharply increased since the 1980s”, as have the sizes of our portions.  For example, when McDonald’s opened in 1955, the biggest soda available was 7 ounces.  Now a small is 16 ounces.

Plus, who can forget “Super Size Me” by Morgan Spurlock?  I know it made an impression on me… but sadly enough, I found myself in the mood for some McDonald’s food while I watched it.

The New York Times published a piece last December about McDonald’s restaurants in Seminole County, Florida who reward students with a Happy Meal from McDonald’s as a “food prize” in their “report card incentive” program.  This stirred up quite a bit of controversy.

A BBC News poll of 9,000 people found that although 40% of respondents blame food for obesity issues (over lack of exercise or genetics), our fast food habits aren’t slowing down at all — globally too.  Some analysts predict that 55% of McDonald’s earnings this year will come from outside the U.S.

It seems to me that as much as we love to complain about our health issues, we are unwilling to change our habits and do anything about it.  I love a juicy cheeseburger as much (if not more) than the next person, even though I realize that I probably shouldn’t eat one every single day.  Our culture still enjoys the rush that comes from eating.  Oddly, while we are often in control of most areas of our lives, we let food consumption spiral out of control, because we enjoy eating so much.

So, I’m sorry fast food restaurants, but I hope that we start eating less from your establishments and start getting healthier. It is possible to change; our portion sizes sure have!

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JUNE 27, 2008

Sometimes referred to as risk homeostasis, the theory of risk compensation states that individuals have an innate target level of overall acceptable risk that rarely ever fluctuates. In other words, when the level of acceptable risk in one part of your life changes, you may find a corresponding rise or drop in acceptable risk elsewhere, thus restoring your overall level of risk to its original target state.

We’ve also known for some time now that humans – and even animals – have an natural tendency to adjust their behavior in response to perceived changes in risk, most noticeably with regard to road safety.

But today we’re finding more and more that risk compensation behavior is offsetting the effectiveness of “one-size-fits-all” solutions to our nation’s most pressing health and safety problems.

For example, new drugs have been developed to lower the risk of heart attack, but many people have responded, “I can eat more fatty foods, because this pill will keep my heart in check.”

Car safety has been improved to minimize the risk of injury in an accident, but drivers now think, “I can afford to drive faster, because my car will keep me safe if I get in a wreck.”

Bathtub seats have been developed to reduce the risk of an infant drowning, so many parents now reason, “I can leave my child alone for a while longer, because this seat was designed to keep him from drowning.”

This human behavior has parallels in other areas of our life beyond risk.  In fact, our paradoxical and often subconscious tendency to compensate for changes in our surroundings could have profound implications for 21st century innovation.

Consider our use of innovation around fuel efficiency, for instance.  Despite soaring oil prices, we’re still driving as much as we did five years ago, at a rate of 1.7 trillion passenger-car-miles a year.  Why?

An article entitled “Strange Behavior” in last month’s Forbes magazine suggests that fuel-efficient cars may have a self-defeating effect on our driving habits – that “hybrid owners are spending just as much on gasoline as before because the added efficiency allows them to rationalize driving more miles.”

By compensating for the added efficiency, however, we’re essentially fueling the very fire that innovation is poised to put out: our dependence on oil.

So, what’s it going to take to change our stubborn ways?  Perhaps companies will have to design product manuals intended to educate the public on the counter-productivity of misusing modern innovation.  Or maybe we just need more incentives to use new technologies for their stated purpose.  Worst case scenario?  The government passes new legislation to curtail our tendency to fall into these moral hazards.  As an optimist, however, I certainly have hope that it will never come to that.

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