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Katha Pollitt and Andrew Sullivan

Good Morning Andrew,
There's an interesting letter in this morning's New York Times from one Stephen Bezruchka, M.D., who teaches public health at the U. of Washington. He praises Japan for refusing to "have a crisis" (lay off lots of workers, cut back govt. programs, force the closing of small businesses etc) in response to their economic troubles. Japanese social cohesion, he says, its (relative to us) equality, explains its high level of health--longest life expectancy in the world. They spend less that half of what we do on health care, but achieve far more. Amazingly, the proportion of Japanese men who smoke is twice that in U.S., but their death rates from smoking are far lower. (I'm surprised the tobacco companies haven't picked up on that.)

Dr. Bezruchka's letter casts an interesting light on the front-page story, "Health Insurers Seek Big Increases in their Premiums." So much for all those savings that were supposed to come with managed care.

Cheers,
Katha

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