Wednesday, April 21, 2010

BIGGEST LOSER - Monday 19th April 2010

A big day to day in Canberra with COAG coagulating all day over a new national hospitals policy and the Biggest Loser final on TV.





And what a final it was.

Winner can laugh and losers can please themselves.


All the people who started out in the show, including those who were kicked off at some stage were all acting like biggest losers. If you want to feel good, drop half a dozen dress sizes and get a hole punch for your belt.

Last week Chairman Rudd made an announcement of momentous proportions.

The Commonwealth Government will give $400m for doctors to monitor patients with diabetes. Hello! How useful is that? About as useful as a hip pocket on a singlet. Another farce, repeated over as tragedy.

You can't fix a fitness problem in a surgery.

If every diabetic had to go to a Biggest Loser program for a month for a fitness, diet and motivation program, the incidence of adult onset diabetes would drop through the floor. Doctors would have the seat out of their trousers, drug company shares would plummet, the International Diabetes Institute could fold up and Paul Zimmett would be enjoying retirement.

Imagine $400 to the fitness industry to get unfit, unhealthy people back into good shape. Not on your nelly.

The other big ticket item on the COAG agenda is mental health. The medical lobby is lobbying furiously for - you guessed it - more money.


Now I don't want to make light of the black dog of (clinical) depression, but, recognising that a significant component of depression is metabolically generated, a month at a biggest loser program would be a lot more beneficial for most people than a slab of Zoloft.

In the long run, exercise is a more powerful antidote to depression that a selective serotonin uptake reinhibitor.

I'm never quite sure what 'untake reinhibitor' means, but I presume it means 'booster'.


I can't get anyone to tell me how I can measure whether my brain is lacking in serotonin either. It seems a strange thing that a person can go into a surgery and after 20 minutes come out with a prescription for something to boost their serotonin levels without knowing whether the amount of serotonin in their brain has dropped to a dangerously low level.

I've written to the mercurial trick cyclist, Ian Hickie but this is one bit of correspondence he doesn't seem to want to answer. He told me to get in touch with Beyond Blue. Beyond Blue tells you to ask your doctor! The shrink in the next block gave me the brush off; told me not to worry about it.

Anyway to get back to the Biggest Loser they had clips of these people talking about themselves before they started the program. Definitely a miserable bunch at their wits end as to what to do.
And then, three months later they're all jumping out of their skins. In fact some had jumped so far out of their skin they'd lost over 40% of their body weight.

So, there it is, two birds killed with one stone. People back into good shape and feeling absolutely fantastic.

Meanwhile the Commonwealth Government's response to a diabetes problem will be to 'let them eat Gliclazide and Lipitor. Their answer to a depression problem will be to 'let them eat Zoloft.'

This is what happens when you put the foxes in charge of the hen house.


On the track
Out for the morning jog today with the boys. Felt good, didn't push it.


In the meantime stay tuned highly tuned and wait for the Prime Minister to wipe the floor with the Premiers and Chief Ministers at tomorrow's continued COAG meeting. The ACT Chief Minister is already lying on his back with his legs in the air.


John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.,com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

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