Several years ago, I wrote a post about things I knew for a fact that were true. That post was about how to walk and step properly. I’m an ultrarunner, and if you run 50 or 100 miles, such things become an issue. So, I felt pretty sure about that.
I later read a book called Deep Survival which cited a study that said that most major airplane accidents happened as a result of faulty safety equipment. This means the bad safety equipment actually causes the crash. This occurs because every time something goes wrong on a plane we build a safety into it to prevent that occurence. That adds complexity. The additional complexity increases chance of failure, and something like moral hazard occurs because of confidence in safety equipment. I.E. Apparently when planes had naked propellers almost nobody walked into them and got shredded because it was such and obvious and apparent danger. Now that jets are shrouded and the danger hidden many more accidents occur from carelessness.
Then I read this book called Born to Run which starts with a simple question from the author: “Why does my foot hurt?” He was trying to get into shape, and started jogging and immediately encountered all kinds of severe foot and knee problems. He saw orthopedic surgeons and podiatrists and they tried all kinds of orthotics, but in the end told him he probably shouldn’t run.
This pissed him off because he new of a group, the Tarahumara Indians. They are all dirt poor. They do not have the benefit of 30 years of sports medicine, modern running shoes, or anything else. The Tarahumara all run 100s of miles in sandals made out of old tires into their 60s 70s and 80s. Foot and knee problems are virtually unknown, as is cancer and diabetes, and obesity, and heart disease, yet they all drink and many smoke. He learned about them because some race property had brought five essentially random Tarahumara from their below sea level desert environment to 6,000 ft altitude Leadville Colorado to compete in one of the most grueling ultramarathons ever. They showed up in Serapes and Sombreros, smoking cigarettes, and all five of them beat every other elite athlete there by a wide margin, wearing their sandals made from old tires. One of them was a man in his 50s. They finished 1,2,3,4, and 5.
If they could do that without any technology or help, why couldn’t the author with all of medical knowledge, 30 years worth of running shoe design, biometrics, diet, etc etc run 3 miles without keeling over in pain.
The short answer, well proven in the book is that the shoes and the Doctors were causing the pain. Take for example, the arch. Any mason knows that an arch gets its strength from the downward pressure on it. If you push up from underneath an arch, you weaken it and it falls apart. Basic physics.
How then can one explain “arch supports?”
The Tarahumara are different. In reality, they are not great runners, they are really superior athletes. We think of athleticism as being able to do one thing really well. we specialize. We have swimmers, runners, weight lifters, etc.
Think of Tarzan. You never know what Tarzan will do. He could run, swim, lift a weight, climb a tree, fight a lion. He could do everything. The Tarahumara are like Tarzan. They can do everything. They run on broken terrain, live in cliffs. They are supremely confident at a wide array of physical skills. We rely on Nike shoes to cushion our feet and coddle them. They are in contact with the ground, so they feel and adjust their stride to avoid injury where we do do not, because our feet do not feel , and our knees and ankles and feet suffer for it.
It’s a good book. The author studies the Tarahumara and then runs a 50 mile race. I recommend the book.
Healthcare.
We are not unhealthy because we don’t have health insurance and poor medical care, we are unhealthy because we eat too much shit and too much, period. We don’t exercise or take care of ourselves properly. We place the responsibility for our well-being in the hands of healthcare providers and other entities that cannot supply us with health or wellbeing at any cost. Their attempts to do so, not only often cause more damage than good, they present us with moral hazard in and of themselves.
This is not to say Doctors are bad. The Tarahumara die of broken bones, appendicitis, pneumonia and other issues that a Doctor can help with. They die from these things because they cannot rely on Doctors to help them.
However, because they do not rely on Doctors to help them they do not die of things that are killing us by the millions. We die of diseases of excess and indolence. They do not. Overrall, they are much healthier and live longer lives with greater quality of life than we do.
We could have the best of both worlds.
We do not have a healthcare crisis. It is not lack of insurance or available healthcare that is the problem. It is a misplaced reliance on those things to the exclusion of taking care of ourselves that is at fault.