The Actual Corporate - Government Causes of Death in the US
There are three ways to look at the causes of death in the US. The standard way is look at pathology that caused death (e.g., heart disease) but this doesn't tell you what caused the person to develop heart disease. Therefore, the Journal of the American Medical Association published a series of articles about the actual causes of death. For example, Tobacco is a leading cause of death because it caused lung cancer, heart disease and many other diseases. Diet, exercise and obesity is another behavioral complex. However, this approach focused on patient behavior. The problem is that people are often not responsible for their diseases. They are exposed to things or work in unsafe conditions because they need money etc. ... The following is a list of both external and internal causes. A link to the article can be found here.
President Obama has recently spoken about a need for further actions as part of health care reform. The following list explains why. The following also should play a role in prioritizing the Democratic agenda.
1. 450,000 Deaths Medical Errors (350,000) and Lack of Insurance (50,000) - The most common medical errors are medical personnel not washing their hands and adverse drug reactions that could be prevented by more system checks. There is a systemic lack of quality of care in many areas. For example, in the US its seven times more likely that your diabetes is out of control compared to Spain. Who profits from this? Insurance companies and hospitals.
2 443,000 Tobacco Who profits tobacco companies who don't have to pay for the damage they cause (203 billion per year).
3. 400,00 Lack of Exercise Which Along With A Poor Diet Causes Causes Obesity. Exercising also improves your immune function and increases your mental alertness. Experts say we don't exercise because we're lazy but because we're overworked and over stressed. People spend too much time at work and work too hard when they are there. We need laws to prevent this and we need more vacation time. Employers need to do more to support health
3. 200,000 Poor Diets excluding obesity-related deaths which are covered under obesity. Obesity is the person-blame idea but experts say everything in the middle of a grocery story is going to kill you in some way. We need to ban or tax unsafe foods.
4. 85,000 Alcoholism Tax the alcohol distributors for the havoc they cause and this problem will be reduced
5. 80,000 Pollution-related deaths Need to transfer to green energy and in the mean time make dirty energy less profitable by forcing companies to pay for the death and destruction they cause.
6. 65,000 Work Stress related deaths. Don't kill yourself for the company and you know they encourage doing just that.
7. 59,000 Workplace injuries. Avoid jobs that kill (Hint: Most are now reality shows). Our work injury rate is more than ten times higher than Britain.
8. 55,000 Deaths From Violence. Violence includes both suicides and homicides and both can be significantly reduced by gun control, improvements in mental health screening and treatment (especially for youth) , education reform that reduces aggression in the classroom, workers' rights and a more civil society.
9. 36,000 Consumer Product Deaths. In most of Europe products have to be proven to be safe before they are introduced. We could reduce our death rate by adopting their policies.
10. Traffic 17,600 non-alcohol related deaths per year. Alcohol-related traffic deaths were counted under alcoholism. Raod safety science is highly advanced but we're not using it. Again, Europe which used to be behind us is way ahead again. Safe cars that track people who speed, revamping high risk road structures, lower speed limit in places where accidents have occurred, more public transportation better design to allow shorter commutes are just a few possibilities.
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