Chinese Herbal Medicine

Fairness and equality, much like communism, are concepts that pull at the hardwired nature of we humans. For reasons no doubt much to do with the evolutionary success of our ancestors, we instinctively seek to tear down those who have more than we do. Fairness and equality, again much like communism, turn into a race for the bottom when put into practice:

Creating "equality" by taking from the successful ruins the creation of wealth - very much a non-zero sum game - for all. It takes away the vital incentives and rewards for success. At the end of the process, as demonstrated by all that transpired in the Soviet Union, you are left with the same old inequalities, but now taking place amongst ruins, starvation and disease.

I noticed an exploration of one manifestation of this human urge today:

The fair innings argument maintains that for healthcare resources to be distributed fairly every person should receive sufficient healthcare to provide them with the opportunity to live in good health for a normal span of years. What constitutes a normal span of years is often defined as life expectancy at birth, but this criterion fails to provide adequate grounds for the equal distribution of healthcare across and between generations. A more suitable criterion for the normal life span is the idea that the human life span is biologically limited. Many current gerontological theories argue that the biological limit to human life spans is related to the ageing process. If technological advances in medicine can retard the ageing process by treating and preventing the diseases and disorders associated with it, human longevity will be limited only by the developments in and the successful application of medicine. In consequence, the fair innings argument will no longer be able to justify denying people healthcare resources because they have lived longer than the normal life span.

The very existence of the fair innings argument - the term coming from cricket, I imagine, refering to a decent time spent at bat, a good life lived, time to get out of the pool - is a terrible end manifestation of the urge to equality. That people talk about denying medical care to those who need it the most, and that they establish an idea of what length of life should be in defense of that aim, demonstrates that any attempt to impose equality is also a retreat from compassion and a refutation of progress.

An older paper runs along much the same lines and is open access: the basics of the fair innings argument haven't changed.

The fair innings argument (FIA) is frequently put forward as a justification for denying elderly patients treatment when they are in competition with younger patients and resources are scarce. In this paper I will examine some arguments that are used to support the FIA. My conclusion will be that they do not stand up to scrutiny and therefore, the FIA should not be used to justify the denial of treatment to elderly patients, or to support rationing of health care by age.

The whole debate has to be put in context, however. This is related to the operation of the universal health care system in the UK, a system that has long been in the doleful steady state of all such socialist, centralized systems: waste, terrible services, and - most importantly - rationing. Every taxpayer involuntarily funding this behemoth feels that they own a piece of it, and everyone has that tug on their human nature urging them to make sure that no-one gets more than they do. It's ugly, and it's why socialism fails. Along the way to failure, however, it produces dangerous ideas, such as "human beings have a fixed length of life, after which they should be cut off and left to die."

I much prefer the vanishing alternate path for health provision: a free market of competing service providers, and people taxed less, free to save and plan for their own medical needs. In that environment progress and longevity are welcome, and increased need for medicine is a market opportunity to excel in providing services.

I say if this were a privatized system, we would all say “gee it’s wonderful. All these people want more health care, this industry is thriving”. Let me put one other analogy. Suppose we made cars a government entitlement. Instead of cheering when auto production went up, we’d say, "Oh my God, we can’t afford this!". How you finance it may greatly affect the psychology and actually the freedom of the economy to take advantage of these new opportunities.

Sadly, freedom in medical choice is not the zeitgeist of this age. Worse looks more likely than better for the years immediately ahead.

Miscellaneous News

New smoking bans to be introduced in the state of Victoria, Australia will be a blow to many smokers as they mean it will be illegal to smoke in cars carrying children and on public school grounds.

The advertising of cigarettes and smoking cigarette at 'point-of-sale', will also be banned by the Victorian Government and cigarettes will in future be stored in a cupboard or under the counter and advertised only by a plain sign with prices.

Kylie Lindorff policy manager of Quit Victoria says it is hoped the new advertising restrictions will lead to fewer children taking up smoking.

Ms Lindorff says currently cigarettes are advertised as a normal product, often in close proximity to lollies, milk and bread, which can encourage the idea that smoking is normal and they should try it.

Ms Lindorff says this can also tempt those trying to quit into impulse buying.

Next on the anti-smoking lobby's agenda is for cigarettes to be sold in plain packets and there are already plans afoot to lobby the Federal Government next year to legislate for plain cigarette packaging, only displaying a large, graphic health warning and the name of the brand.

Victoria Health chief executive Todd Harper says it is on the packet where appealing images and attributes appear, meant to entice both new and existing smokers.

The tobacco industry will also be up against a record $22 million anti-smoking advertising strategy which will subject Victorians to least four anti-smoking ads every month, aimed at reducing adult smoking rates by 20% by 2013 and targeting in particular high-risk groups such as pregnant women to quit - $1.5 million will come from the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation.

However critics say retailers have been given a reprieve of more than two-years before the cigarette display ban will be enforced - when New South Wales introduced similar laws last month, retailers were only given six months to a year to comply.

Victorian retailers will also not face penalties until 2011 and smoking bans on motorists with children will not come into force until 2010.

Medical Condition News

According to the latest information cancer is on the increase in Australia.

In a report by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare on cancer statistics for 2008 new cancer cases are expected to increase by over 3,000 cases per year.

The report shows that the number of new cancer cases diagnosed in Australia each year passed the 100,000 mark for the first time in 2005 and the number of new cases in 2008 is estimated to be over 108,000.

The report, Cancer in Australia 2008, has revealed that the major impact cancer has already had on the health system is all set to continue and the number of cancer-related hospital admissions is projected to rise by over 23,000 per year in the short term.

Ms Christine Sturrock of the Institute's Health Registers and Cancer Monitoring Unit says this figure does not include cancer being treated in outpatient settings.

According to the report there will be over 42,000 deaths from cancer in 2008 and that this number will increase by over 800 deaths per year.

Ms Sturrock says the increase in the number of cancer diagnoses, hospital encounters and cancer deaths is being driven by Australia's ageing population and although the actual number of cancer deaths has increased, there has also been a significant increase in cancer survival over the last 20 years and more people are living longer after being diagnosed with cancer.

In 2005 the most common cancer in females was breast cancer (over 27% of all diagnoses) and in males it was prostate cancer, (29% of all diagnoses) and the second most common cancer in both men and women is bowel cancer.

The next three most common cancers in both sexes are melanoma of the skin, lung cancer and lymphoma.

The first phase of the National Bowel Cancer Screening Program, which aims to cut the incidence and deaths from bowel cancer, offered test kits to just under 1 million Australians aged 55 and 65 years between August 2006 and June 2008.

The free tests which detect blood in the faeces, which may be an indication of cancer, were used by about 43% of those people eligible and found that around 8% had blood detected and of these, an estimated 5% were found to have bowel cancer while a further 12% had pre-cancerous polyps.

The AIHW report also shows that Tasmania has some of the highest cancer rates in the country with an annual average of 433 cases per 100,000 people and lung cancer is overtaking breast cancer as a killer of Tasmanian women - Tasmania continues to have, high rates of smoking and the Cancer Council says the figures are alarming.

Disease/Infection News

One of Malaysia's top politicians has apparently suggested that HIV carriers should not be allowed to marry in order to avoid having sick children.

The chief minister of northern Perak state, Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin, has been quoted as saying that people who are very sick with such a disease should not be allowed to get married as any 'breeding' will pass the virus on to the embryo which is 'unfair' because the disease is then passed on to the child.

His comments follow an official statement from the Department of Islamic Development, which says that Muslims who test positive for HIV, should still be allowed to marry.

According to Nizar's office the minister was referring to both Muslims and non-Muslims - Nizar is member of the opposition Islamist party Parti Islam se-Malaysia (PAS).

The debate on the right of HIV/AIDS carriers, especially Muslims, to marry was fuelled last week when Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak apparently said all Muslim couples in Malaysia must undergo HIV screening before getting married.

The controversy comes at a time when many Malaysian Muslims are struggling to come to terms with concerns associated with a rise in hard-line Islam - last month Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said Muslims are allowed practice yoga but without chanting, which reversed an outright ban that had caused a furore - the Malaysian government has also threatened to shut down a Catholic newspaper for using the world "Allah," saying it could inflame the country's Muslim population.

While ethnic Malay Muslims are politically dominant in the country accounting for around 60% of the population, Malaysia's 26 million populace also has considerable numbers of ethnic Indian and Chinese minorities include Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists and Christians.

In Malaysia while new HIV infections dropped to 3,452 in 2008, compared to 6,756 in 2003, infections among women through normal sexual intercourse rose from 5.02 percent of total cases in 1997 to 16.3 percent last year.

Najib Razak says seen from society's point of view as well from the view of individuals concerned, it is in everyone's interest to know whether prospective husbands are free from HIV.

Medical Research News

Australian researchers have issued a warning about the danger of "head-banging" which is usually associated with heavy-metal music.

The researchers from the University of New South Wales say fans who indulge in head-banging put themselves at risk of head and neck injuries and they advise fans to either wear a protective brace or switch to slower tempo music.

"Head-banging" involves violent and rhythmic head movements in time with the music and was first seen as far back as 1969 at a Led Zeppelin concert in the U.S., when the front row audience members were seen banging their heads on the stage in time to the music.

Head-banging is a worldwide phenomenon but even though there have been reports on the risks of injury especially to the head and neck, little formal research has been conducted and only a few unique cases have been documented.

Experts suspect the incidence of injury is much higher, because the symptoms are clinically silent or cause only mild headache that resolves spontaneously.

The study has revealed that an average head-banging song with a tempo of 146 beats a minute could cause mild head injury when the head's range of motion is greater than 75 degrees and the researchers say higher tempos which encourage greater ranges of motion carry a higher risk of injury.

Researcher Dr. Andrew McIntosh who is an injury expert says injuries might be minimised if head-bangers at rock concerts were to lessen their range of head and neck motion and head-banging to every second beat.

Dr. McIntosh says possible preventive interventions include limiting the range of neck motion through a formal training program delivered before a concert, using personal protective equipment, such as neck braces, to limit range of motion or switching to easy-listening music like Michael Bolton, Celine Dion, Enya and Richard Clayderman.

Dr. McIntosh says the "up-down" head banging style is the most common - others included the circular swing, the full body, or the side-to-side this was discovered by observing young people at hard-rock and heavy-metal concerts - hard rock and heavy metal account for 30% all of U.S. record sales.

The study by research assistant Declan Patton and associate professor Dr. Andrew McIntosh, from the School of Risk and Safety Sciences at UNSW is published in the British Medical Journal.