A slow motion plague…
A slow motion plague, the failing model of “disease management” vs “health care”
Its time to change the narrative!
These last 18 months we all have had our lives turned upside down in some way, with many experiencing more serious and or lifechanging consequences from this period than others. If there is one thing, I hope, for our community moving forward it is that we change the narrative and understanding about “health”, what it actually means, how our bodies work and what simple things we can all do to help ourselves so that we regain some of the personal power we have lost or unknowingly given away these past 18 months. Only when we shift our focus to preventative healthcare and take personal responsibility for our health and wellbeing will we protect our health services and community for the future.
Unfortunately, as much as we are all hoping and praying for normality to resume, I fear the “pandemic” rollercoaster is not over yet and we likely have a few more years of the current narrative of fear, disempowerment, coercion, manipulation, and deception ahead of us. I do not state this to cause distress, but to inspire you to use this time to create meaningful, effective, and empowering changes to your lifestyle, diet and wellbeing so that whatever these next couple of years brings, you will be in a stronger, healthier, more resilient and informed position to manage what life throws your way. As the famous quote by Thomas Fuller states “health is not valued until sickness comes”, let’s not wait until this is the case, the time has come to take your power back.
There is an elephant in the room that our leaders and health authorities appear to be choosing to ignore as they continue to spend tax payers money further on inaccurate PCR tests, million pound national vaccine marketing campaigns (with no understanding of long term risk, long term effects or ongoing costs) and track and trace apps that are causing further burden and stress on the economy and health service, which is what we had originally set out to protect. The mind boggles how we are still progressing down this path and yet at no point during the last 18-month media fear campaign has the “propaganda machine” mentioned our immune system or what we as individuals can do to help support our “health” and defences naturally. It makes me wince that our biggest weapon and defence against biological threats, which has protected us as a species for thousands of years has been discounted as unimportant, irrelevant and of apparent insignificance when presented with a Big Pharma experimental chemical alternative. To be clear I am not saying that these jabs are not clinically justified or beneficial to some; however, I do believe from considering the ever-growing clinical data since March 2020 that for young, healthy individuals and anyone of childbearing age or younger the clinical justification or guaranteed long-term safety is simply not there, and it is dangerous and reckless (in my opinion) to suggest otherwise.
Our “health” service as a business is at complete odds with what it is meant to be offering, health! Our current medical paradigm is based more on managing disease and suppressing symptoms than it is on preventing and reversing disease or promoting health. Imagine a linear spectrum, where death sits on the far right and perfect health on the far left. Our current system intervenes at the right end of the spectrum. The closer a patient gets to death, the less chance a clinician has of restoring that patient to health. Yet, that’s precisely where we are spending our greatest resources. Heroic interventions can prevent death some of the time, but don’t necessarily promote health, in fact it could be argued that in the case of these jabs for healthy young people and children with statistically no risk, that they may in fact be pushing us further to the right of the spectrum towards disease and death!
Now what if we thought outside the box. We are a small independent (ish) island and could revolutionise our healthcare system if we stopped following the UK NHS model and started focussing on root cause medicine not symptoms medicine. We have already burnt however many millions on new hospital plans and still have no hospital, but what if we took a step back and really considered what we need to do to ensure we are protecting islanders and our healthcare system of the future. I believe we have the opportunity to do something truly amazing whilst also attracting motivated, skilled and passionate staff to a revolutionary healthcare model that will ultimately lower “chronic care costs” whilst improving patient outcomes. Worth thinking about no?
We are living in a point in time where human beings are the sickest they have ever been and this is only due to worsen. The rise in chronic health conditions is soaring at a rate faster than we can throw money at research. We are living longer but with more health complaints and ongoing care requirements. We have a growing ageing population that need to be cared for by the working populations tax contributions, yet we have a rising younger generation suffering with increasing mental health and chronic health complaints. This not only impacts their wellbeing but their ability to work and contribute to the ever demanding and increasing health and social care pot. Fertility rates in women have dropped leaving acute pressure on where we will find funding in years to come to service our growing chronic healthcare costs. The irony is we are wealthier, have far better healthcare systems and technology at our fingertips than our ancestors, yet our health is declining and worse than ever.
Why?
Our diets and lifestyles are not in alignment with our genes. It may come as a shock to many that our genes have barely changed for centuries. Despite the attention genes have received in the press they cannot be blamed. It is our diets, lifestyles and environments that have drastically changed causing us to express our genes differently. Genetically we are not that dissimilar from our hunter gatherer ancestors and our bodies require the same fuel or nutrition to function. If we consider our ancestors, they did not suffer with obesity, heart disease, diabetes, or prolific cancers, because their diets and lifestyles were in alignment with their environment and genetics. It is not a coincidence that our exponential rise in chronic diseases such as heart disease, cancers, diabetes, dementia to name a few coincide with the introduction of industrial farming and “advancements” in technology and science. As we have advanced in certain fields we have regressed in others, moving further towards symptoms, ill health, disease and ultimately death.
We have moved further away from an ancestral diet of whole, nutrient dense foods like, meat, fish, eggs, vegetables, fruit, nuts and seeds and more towards our typical “western diets” of refined carbohydrates (bread, flower, cakes, pastries), refined sugar, fizzy drinks, processed meats and heavily processed foods. These “foods” if indeed we can even call them that create imbalance within the gut and microbiome, which leads to dysregulation in the immune system causing a whole host of varying symptoms and leading ultimately to disease. It is not a coincidence that a diet predominantly favouring the above western foods combined with lifestyles of too much stress, not enough exercise and too little or disrupted sleep, lead to ill health.
So, what do we do about it?
Stop weaponising fear and using this to control and disempower people, educate them instead and provide tools, advice and information on diet, nutrition and lifestyle behaviours that improve health.
Start educating our community through effective, proactive, and positive marketing campaigns where we could see huge gains for a relatively small investment.
Educate as early as possible in schools and nurseries so the next generations coming through will know to make better health choices.
Reward healthy living or lifestyle behaviours through lower tax rates or similar financial incentives.
Invest in peripheral and ancillary health sectors to support those with health needs towards better health not merely in symptom management.
Invest heavily in mental health services for the young and support them back to health focussing on diet, lifestyle, stress management behaviours as a priority alongside conventional approaches where necessary.
Invest in training for all medics on diet, lifestyle and nutrition to support the new model.
Build healthcare teams that support a functional approach to health care.
Start talking about the immune system and stop favouring “interventions” over a natural protective immune response.