UPDATE:Whoops, I'm retarded. I've been doing that a lot lately. I never thought it was possible to get lazy enough to fail at this job, but I guess we all sink to low expectations. America had malaria and got rid of it, so her point still stands. None the less, I'll leave this up merely because Megan is simultaneously saying we can't afford to help those not well off while touting how lucky we are to be able to help ourselves so thoroughly. It's still a case of healthcare for me and not thee, even if it is a case of "Toast is being a bit of a knee jerk idiot, lately" as well.
HOLY CRAP!
Scientists now think that King Tut may have died of malaria. As the fellow who sent me the link dryly noted, King Tut did not have good comprehensive health insurance.How many people die from malaria each year, Megan? Only a million!
All kidding aside, this is a good excuse to meditate on just how rich we are. King Tut was probably the wealthiest man in the world during his time. He died of something that wouldn't kill the most abjectly immiserated welfare mother in the United States today, because of a combination of public health efforts, and cheap antimalarial drugs.
You always need to factor in things like this when you talk about changes in living standards over time. All the positive changes in society mean that the absolute difference between the income of Bill Gates and the man who valets his car is larger than it has ever been in history. But the actual difference in comfort between the two of them is probably much smaller than the difference between JP Morgan and his stableboy. And both Gates and the valet are almost immeasurably better off than their predecessors.
How much malaria is there in America?
NONE!
For someone who recently traveled to Vietnam, she sure has the knowledge of someone who's never left America.
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11 comments:
She only seems to make claims about the likelihood of US residents to die of malaria...
And she still seems like a complete idiot.
Yes, but talking about America's safety from malaria is like talking about Greenland's amazing ability to keep the temperature low in the summer. It has nothing to do with anything.
But the only reason there is no malaria in the US is that we are relatively rich and malaria drugs are cheap (as she argues). Malaria was a problem in the US until the 40s (unlike hot summers in greenland).
Oh, well, I'm retarded then. I thought that malaria was just not naturally endemic to America.
Hello,
Hmm...I didn't know that Malaria was a large problem in the US (like polio). Nevertheless, if you guys have the time, you should read http://www.gladwell.com/2001/2001_07_02_a_ddt.htm
At the worst, it's a good read.
Regards
SV
Personally I've read a lot about DDT already in graduate classes. Interesting stuff. It's quintessential, both as an environmental toxin and as a modern health marvel. I believe it's a comment on the duality of man, sir.
It's a hardball world, son.
Why is there so much Full Metal Jacket in Italian on youtube?
More nitpicky details, but I'm pretty sure malaria isn't "endemic to America". Malaria wasn't in the Americas prior to 1492, but was brought over after the European voyages of discovery. However, endemic or not, malaria was certainly present in the Southern USA between 1500ish and 1900ish.
Megan makes the same tired argument you can find on any conservative blog or message board from the past 20 years: "The poor have TVs, and new nikes, and boom boxes- they're better off than 90% of the world, but for some reason libs think they don't live well."
It's all part of the "don't tax my million dollar salary to help someone with a boom box" line of deep political theory.
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