The maladies of affluence

http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9616897

Reading Report 27

Title: The maladies of affluence
Source: http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9616897
Date: Aug 9th 2007

Vocabulary:
Maladies: any disorder or disease of the body, esp. one that is chronic or deepseated
Heapes: A group of things placed or thrown, one on top of the other
Lurid: gruesome; horrible; revolting
Ailments: A physical or mental disorder, especially a mild illness
Bears down: to press or weigh down
Endowment: Funds or property donated to an institution, individual, or group as a source of income
Levelled off: to become stable; reach a constant or limit
Swiggers: to drink heartily or greedily
Inoculate: to implant (a disease agent or antigen) in a person, animal, or plant to produce a disease for study or to stimulate disease resistance

Summary:
Since the 1600s rich countries have been infecting poor ones. From the times of colonisation, poor countries have been suffering from different diseases which were brought by people coming from richer environments.
Chronic diseases kill more people than infectious ones. The heart attack death rate is one example. More people die from heart attacks than some other infectious diseases like HIV/AIDS and malaria put together. However for the last decades, the average life expectancy has been raised from 50 to 65 years of age due to the health care programmes and investments.

Personal Reaction:
I think that in our rushing times we are more likely to have an unhealthy diet. We are becoming accustomed to eating more junk food and faster than ever. We are not taking care of our long term health, which means that we don’t care much about suffering from aheart disease down the line.
I believe that it’s not just a matter of blaming others for our own faults. In other words, I partly agree with the article. It’s true that in the early stages of colonialisation, the newcomers brought many diseases with them which were not part of our systems, but, I don’t think that they can still be blamed for the bad choices we make in our eating habits.
Heart diseases are not taken seriously. The bad part is that it is a silent killer. Most of the people suffering from disbalance in their bodies, don’t realize about it until it is too late. The same happens with diabetes. Diabetic patients don’t know that they suffer from it until they have to follow a strict treatment to manage their problems. Even when they know about it, they seem to be reluctant to take special care of themselves. I know many people who suffer from diabetes, but they just seem not to care much about it. They are grown ups behaving as childs, hiding themselves to eat sweets or highly dangerous food.
Everything is a matter of attitude. In my personal case, I’m overweight, and I know that it is quite unhealthy, but whenever I’m asked for a blood test, doctor find that I’m a perfectly healthy fat girl. My levels in everything are near the lower numbers in the scales of health. That is why they are all the time asking me why is it that I don’t lose weight. The answer is as simple as painful. I hate exercising.