Risky Business: Health Risk, Relativity, and Perception
Patt Morrison of KPCC Radio in Southern California talks to me about how people make various rational and irrational decisions in their lives. CLICK HERE to listen.
Patt Morrison of KPCC Radio in Southern California talks to me about how people make various rational and irrational decisions in their lives. CLICK HERE to listen.
The HPV vaccine saves lives. It does so by reducing a person’s chance of being infected by the human papilloma virus, a virus that causes a whole range of cancers including, most importantly, cervical cancer. Vaccinate your teenage daughter against HPV, and you will increase the chance she will live to old age. Simple as…
Sarcopenia: a mysterious disorder that causes people’s muscles to shrink away. 25%, 30%, even greater loss of strength… until the victim is struggling to make it up to the second floor bedroom. Would you undergo a treatment for this disorder if it was safe and effective? And do you think your insurance company should pay…
Clearly we in the United States are not taking the obesity epidemic as seriously as the Russian government. We debate whether it is appropriate for the government to require restaurants to inform their customers about how many calories they are consuming. Whereas in Moscow, sit at a park bench, and it will tell you how…
Studying economics in college at the dawn of the Reagan presidency, I learned about the wonders of free-markets. The invisible hand of the market, I read, guarantees that thousands upon thousands of people–each with unique desires, abilities and values–mesh together, thereby able to achieve the balance of work and leisure, and of material and spiritual…
The United States is finally catching up to the rest of the developed world by integrating electronic medical records (EMRs) into our healthcare systems. I thought I would share a couple pictures illustrating just how quickly the U.S. healthcare system is adopting these EMRs. The first picture comes from an article by Emily Jones and…
What would you like first: the good news or the bad news? Let me start with the bad. Life expectancy among patients in the U.S. with thyroid cancer lags behind that in Korea. In fact, the vast majority of patients diagnosed with thyroid cancer in Korea are cured of that illness, a statement I can’t…