American Boomers Less Healthy Than The British

As a former Brit, who trained in medicine in the UK, I was very interested in this story. Health care expenditure is much greater in the USA, but this doesn’t prevent the British aged 55 to 64 from having lower rates of diabetes, high blood pressure, all heart disease, heart attack (MI, or myocardial infarction), stroke, lung disease, and cancer.

Of course, one wants to know “Why this difference?” Smoking was about equal in both countries, but obesity was worse in the USA and heavy drinking more pronounced in the UK, and that may provide a reason. The age-group studied was one that allowed the obesity epidemic in the USA to display itself fully (though not peaking, unfortunately), while the UK runs a bit behind in the fast-food fetishes. Most of the conditions classified above can, in part, be laid at the door of overeating.

We should repeat the survey in ten years’ time – in the same age group – after the USA has had time to try and get its love affair with calories under control.

(I hesitate to conjecture that medical training is better in the UK than in the USA – that would be unfounded prejudice, and probably untrue.)