Human beings have survived for millennia because most of us make good decisions about our health most of the time.
The bottom line is that the human body is complex and subtle and oversimplifying - as common sense sometimes impels us to do - can be hazardous to your health.
The health effects of air pollution imperil human lives. This fact is well-documented.
And I believe that if we can care about whether or not our neighbor has a good job or access to affordable health care for their children and we move to implement the policies that can improve these situations we will unleash vast amounts of human potential and recapture the American spirit.
There's no one place a virus goes to die - but that doesn't make its demise any less a public health victory. Throughout human history viral diseases have had their way with us and for just as long we have hunted them down and done our best to wipe them out.
My personal feeling if I can interject a political note is that I don't think it is right that basic health care is a privilege. It shouldn't be. It should be a right of all human beings. And certainly in the richest country in the world.
Hydraulic fracturing requires massive amounts of water. Disposing of the toxic wastewater as well as accidental spills can contaminate drinking water and harm human health.
Any health care funding plan that is just equitable civilized and humane must - must - redistribute wealth from the richer among us to the poorer and the less fortunate. Excellent healthcare is by definition re-distributional.
I think all Americans believe in human rights. And health is an often overlooked aspect of basic human rights. And it's one that's easily corrected. The reason I say that is that many of the diseases that we treat around the world I knew when I was a child. My mother was a registered nurse. And they no longer exist in our country.
Modern medicine is a negation of health. It isn't organized to serve human health but only itself as an institution. It makes more people sick than it heals.