Let’s Teach Drinking

A reasonable proposition that’ll never happen because of a wag-of-the-finger by the Federal Government.

“The way our society addresses this problem has been about as effective as a parachute that opens on the second bounce. Clearly, state laws mandating a minimum drinking age of 21 haven’t eliminated drinking by young adults—they’ve simply driven it underground, where life and health are at greater risk. Merely adjusting the legal age up or down doesn’t work—we’ve tried that already and failed. But federal law has stifled the ability to conceive of more creative solutions in the only place where the Constitution says such debate should happen—in the state house—because any state that sets its drinking age lower than 21 forfeits 10 percent of its federal highway funds. This is called an “incentive.”

Any prohibitive society, despite it’s most compassionate of intentions, begets the very behavior it wishes to stifle.

Defining American Health Care

An interesting article on our health care system. Jacob Weisberg tackles the system from a moral, financial, and sociological perspective. He finds a tenuous disconnect with the latter.

It is on the sociological level, though, that we’re missing the boat most completely by sticking doggedly with a workplace-based system that no longer makes sense. America has always been a mobile society with a labor market that grows more fluid over time. Once, the norm was to work for a single employer for one’s entire career. Today, people change jobs an average of 11 times before they reach 40. Fear of losing health coverage keeps people in jobs they would otherwise leave, creating a drag on economic efficiency.

Why Congress and the Obama administration tussle over the health care reform, it seems that a small cadre of politicians on both sides of the political line may have stumbled upon something much, much better: Senator Ron Wyden (D-Oregon), who has, perhaps, the most effective, sensible, and cost-effecient way of improving American health care.

A Wank A Day Keeps Infertility Away?

It seems a rigorous masturbation itinerary may increase your chances of getting that special someone knocked-up.

In a paper presented to the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology, Dr. David Greening, an Australian infertility expert, reports that 81 percent of the men in his study significantly improved their sperm quality, as measured by DNA fragmentation, through a simple one-week program.

Simply, participants were instructed to masturbate daily. And how might increased masturbation affect sperm quality?

Greening’s theory is that it shortens the period during which sperm are exposed to harmful molecules in tubes emerging from the testicles. He concludes that to improve their odds of achieving pregnancy, “[c]ouples with relatively normal semen parameters should have sex daily for up to a week before the ovulation date.” But if the exposure theory is correct, he notes, the key isn’t sex. It’s “ejaculatory frequency.”

Avoiding Worry

My latest contribution to When Falls the Coliseum is now up.  I discuss the influence of uncertainty in determining our happiness.

Being Happy Among Uncertainty

Using current economic conditions as an impetus, Harvard Psychology Professor Daniel Gilbert explores human anxiety when confronted with the unknown.

…people feel worse when something bad might occur than when something bad will occur. Most of us aren’t losing sleep and sucking down Marlboros because the Dow is going to fall another thousand points, but because we don’t know whether it will fall or not — and human beings find uncertainty more painful than the things they’re uncertain about.

I would consider myself a worry-wort; something that I’m consciously attempting to remedy.  Most of my stress comes from not being able to know with the utmost certainty, whether it relates to work, school, relationships, et cetera.  When something is “up in the air,” so to speak, than I have a tendency to worry myself into psychological diplegia.

And if unfortunate news befalls for whatever reason, it seems as though my previous worry dissipates.  Why?  Because, despite a calamatous outcome, what was once uncertain now has been made clear.

…when we get bad news we weep for a while, and then get busy making the best of it. We change our behavior, we change our attitudes. We raise our consciousness and lower our standards. We find our bootstraps and tug. But we can’t come to terms with circumstances whose terms we don’t yet know. An uncertain future leaves us stranded in an unhappy present with nothing to do but wait.

First U.S. Swine Flu Death

And it’s a child:

A 23-month-old child in Texas has died from complications of the swine flu, the Center for Disease Control reported this morning, marking the first confirmed fatality in the U.S. from the ominous, little-known virus that is rapidly spreading around the globe.

But it seems things will not worsen to the level Mexico is experiencing with the illness.

As the number of confirmed infections in the United States jumped again and cases were confirmed for the first time in Britain, New Zealand and Israel, researchers searched for clues as to how readily the virus causes the pneumonia that has hospitalized and killed patients in Mexico. Only a handful of patients in the United States and elsewhere outside Mexico have been hospitalized, and severe complications have been relatively rare.

Slow-Motion Sneezing

Gross and awesome all at once:

Is Swine Flu Serious?

Seems like it may be more so than I had thought:

The mortality in Mexico is shockingly high:  81 cases out of 1300, or about 6%.  The great Spanish Flu pandemic, on the other hand, had a mortality of about 2.5%.  Normal rates for flu are less than a tenth of 1%, with most of those deaths occurring in people who are already weak:  children, the elderly, the immunocompromised.  The Spanish Flu hit hardest the 15-34 age group, who seem to have been done in by their own strong immune response.  It’s not clear which pattern this flu follows.

The Impact Of Friends On Your Health

It matters:

A 10-year Australian study found that older people with a large circle of friends were 22 percent less likely to die during the study period than those with fewer friends. A large 2007 study showed an increase of nearly 60 percent in the risk for obesity among people whose friends gained weight. And last year, Harvard researchers reported that strong social ties could promote brain health as we age.

“In general, the role of friendship in our lives isn’t terribly well appreciated,” said Rebecca G. Adams, a professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro. “There is just scads of stuff on families and marriage, but very little on friendship. It baffles me. Friendship has a bigger impact on our psychological well-being than family relationships.”