An interview with Robert Sapolsky talked about how people’s actions are the sum of everything, and talked about the quarantine model for all wrongdoing, and compares it to keeping kids home when they’re sick. I think we need to get that part right first, because many places are not even doing that in fact. I wish someone would inform Sapolsky that in some places they’ve been encouraging kids go to school while sick with covid, and there continue to be schools this school year forced to close and go remote because of too many staff off sick, and there have been op-eds published saying schools should have kids to stay in their seats even if there’s possibly a bomb in the school or presumably even if there’s an active shooter on the premises because the myth of potential “learning loss” worries them more than child deaths.
‘Live to 100’ explores why people in ‘blue zones’ live longer than average PBS NewsHour Dec 23, 2023 Dan Buettner: “I have no faith, and I do not know of any research where you can change a population’s health by trying to convince individuals to change their behaviour or somehow imbue them with responsibility. We’re genetically hardwired to create fat salt and sugar and take rest whenever we want. So unless we set up our environment where it’s easy for us to eat basically whole food plant-based easier for us to walk than it is to drive, we’re going to continue to see healthcare costs in the trillions as we see today in America.”
The “social determinants of health” are well understood. And yet with the pandemic some in leadership positions have insisted that it’s up to individual choices to end the pandemic. Obviously public health is needed for all these things, and the sooner we get behind that as a society, the better off we’ll be.