The following news spots on your health seem worthy of mention:
- Apparently, if you are older than 60, the medical profession is on its way to declaring that if your blood pressure levels do not exceed 150 over 90, YOU MIGHT NOT NEED TO TAKE ANY PILLS FOR THIS CONDITION. Seems that this medication can cause fainting and falling, which could well be worse than merely keeping your pressure lower. Of course, don't just quit your medication with this posting. See your doctor.
- I've said this many times before, but the latest studies show that vitamins and other supplements don't improve your health. This $28 billion/year waste affects 53% of American adults who do take these pills. Specifically cited as a useless are:
- calcium and vitamin D for post-menopausal women
- multivitamins, and worse, they can harm you
- but there are some who still tout creation, fish oil, iron, powdered greens and whey proteins
- Of course, few today smoke three packs of cigarettes daily, but if you do, you will:
- spend $5,000/year
- $200,000 in a lifetime
- pay more for insurance
- suffer from an obnoxious smell
- have a shorter life
- Traveling is good for your mental health. Stressful business trips don't count. The relaxing vacation for leisure is recommended. I wonder, though, if travel might nevertheless be bad for your physical health, for the stresses involved with waking up and catching your plane very early in the morning cannot be healthy. Certainly worrying about being gyped by your taxi driver in certain cities or walking at night in any new environment can affect anxiety.
- Appears that there is now a travel advisory for St. Martin in the Caribbean for chikungunya. I stopped here once on a cruise. This is the first such threat to the Western Hemisphere. What is chikungunya? It's a mosquito-borne virus that can paralyze you. My visit to La Reunion Island involved this disease. I understand, though, that this problem has been controlled there.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average, for the 50th time this year, again broke its all-time record, now up to 16,480. The S&P 500 also topped its high and the Nasdaq hit a 13-year high.
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