I feel abundance or the sense of wealth and health are directly linked.
According to the World Health Organization in 2003, the most devastating killers in the world are HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, Malaria, Childhood Diseases and conditions related to Childbirth. Certainly not in our country, but in developing nations this is what people die of and most of them are preventable diseases. Also according to WHO in 2003, Malaria kills 1 million children a year, mainly in Africa. Almost 2 million per year die of Tuberculosis – 98% of them in developing countries. AIDS kills 3 million people per year. More than half a million women die from complications of pregnancy mainly in Asia and Africa. The saddest statistic is that 8 million children die per year from completely preventable deaths including, pneumonia, diarrhea, malaria and malnutrition. These are diseases that take a small amount of money to completely eliminate.
According to the American Red Cross, for $.33 you can orally rehydrate a child suffering from diarrhea and stop them from dying. This is incomprehensible and does not seem to affect us as we make our mortgage payments and decide which SUV we are going to buy. Or does it?
In industrialized nations we suffer from different illnesses that most people in the third world don’t live long enough to experience. It does not make our suffering any less. Particularly since I now see children and teens suffering from anxiety related disorders and autoimmune disorders. Autoimmune disorders are rampant because of the damage to our environment and toxins that we ingest in our food and water, in addition to a stressful lifestyle that induces our immune system to attack itself. I see more cases of Anxiety, Depression, Ulcerative Colitis, IBS, Crohn’s Disease, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, MS and a host of others. Our stressful lives affect us differently than those in the third world.
How are abundance and health directly linked?
The answer is obviously different for those living in the third world versus people in the U.S. The good news is according to Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland, Director-General of the World Health Organization, “The prospects of intervening to prevent death in developing countries have never been better.” However, at home in the U.S., the number of diseases in increasing. Including the preventable diseases that are due to lifestyle, diet and exercise increase.
The following is a list by percentage of cause of death in the U.S. according to the Nutrition Institute of America:
Cardiovascular Disease – 47%, Cancer – 22%, Smoking- 7%, Prescribed Pharamcuetical drugs – 5%, Alcohol – 4.5%, Preventable Medical Mistakes by M.D.’s – 2.4%, Motor Vehicle Accidents – 2.2%, Suicide – 1.4%, Murder .94%, Pedestrian Vehicle Accidents – .37%, Food – .24%, Drowning – .21%, Home Fires -.19%, Asthma – .19%, Poisonings – .17%, Firearms Accidents – .079%, Freezings – .048%, Electrical Accidents – .038%, Penicillin Allergy – .014%, Lightning – .004%, Sports Injuries – .002%, Dietary Supplements, such as Herbs – .0001%
This seems like a lot of statistics to absorb, but I use it to illustrate a point, Americans’ deaths are highly preventable. Yet in the third world, their diseases are decreasing while ours continue to increase. We are one of the wealthiest countries in the world and we are dying of diseases that are due in large part to lifestyle and stress.
What can we do to prevent these diseases?
We must change our lifestyle as well as our mindset about health and healing. Stress reduction methods, like meditation, exercise, spiritual practices or even simple laughter greatly assist the body to relax and thus function better. I also work in conjunction with patients that want to utilize allopathic medicine and alternative medicine at the same time and promote cooperation of these two industries.
I find it interesting that use of pharmaceutical drugs is one of the fourth leading causes of deaths in this country. Herbs are the last leading cause of death on the above-referenced statistics. Herbs don’t kill but pharmaceutical drugs do. It is interesting that many patients are terrified to take an herb but they have no problem popping an assortment of pharmaceutical drugs that may or may not cause severe complications or even death.
If herbs were a fourth leading cause of death as pharmaceutical drugs, people like me would be chased out of this country or into prison. We keep fighting to have viable herbs available to the public. I use only the best quality of herbs generated by FDA-controlled labs. The reason herbs are not promoted by pharmaceutical companies is that you cannot patent an herb. There’s no money in it for them. It is a food product. A simple product like celery or chamomile that can be grown in your backyard is a current threat to the pharmaceutical industry only because they can’t profit from it. These simple herbs and plants are created for the purpose of healing and have been used for thousands of years.
If you are interested in pursuing a healthy life of abundance and wish to utilize herbs and natural medicines to pursue your health, I am happy to consult with you to provide guidance based on over fifteen years of experience and training.