Curiously this has come at a weird time for me. I didn't think much of healthcare. I just turned 27, and like most twenty-somethings I have this idea that I'm immortal (not literally, but you get the idea). Lately though I've been dealing with a great deal of stress and anxiety related to my job, stress combined with the sickening feeling of doing something that in the long-term just feels so pointless. Coincidentally the internet seems to be preoccupied with cancer and death as of late, or maybe it could just be me. Prior to reading this earlier I found this arresting article regarding colon cancer rates rising in people my age.
It has made me thought about my own mortality, but that only occupies half my thoughts. The other half are preoccupied with this sickening reality that our 21st century technology really isn't all that great.
Sure, we are getting better at beating cancer. Immunotherapy seems especially promising. On the other hand though, it's almost maddening how many people develop a mild pain and find out it's late stage cancer after a doctor's appointment. Had they ignored said mild pain it could've progressed to the point where they're terminally ill.
Facebook can probably build an elaborate psychological profile based on my online habits. It knows my mind. How strange that we can't hope to know our own bodies so well.
> On the other hand though, it's almost maddening how many people develop a mild pain and find out it's late stage cancer after a doctor's appointment.
And in the past we wouldn't have been able to diagnose it or treat it. Medicine gets better, but slowly.
> Coincidentally the internet seems to be preoccupied with cancer and death as of late, or maybe it could just be me. Prior to reading this earlier I found this arresting article regarding colon cancer rates rising in people my age.
The obsession is probably because cancer is one of the few disease things that actually kills people in the 30-50 cohort.
As for the increase, the decrease in healthcare coverage in that group probably didn't help. You won't go to the doctor for non-specific gastrointestinal distress if you don't have healthcare. If you have healthcare, you're probably getting an ultrasound immediately which will catch tumors and growths.
I might also point out the increasing normalization of anal sex among heterosexual individuals is likely to play a part in the colon cancer increase. Throat cancers also increased and that seems to be linked to more oral sex.
I'm 37 and just had a giant colon polyp removed a couple months ago. The gastroenterologists seemed kind of surprised that it (thankfully) wasn't cancerous, just a nasty looking tubulovillous adenoma. If they hadn't removed it it would probably have been a carcinoma pretty soon. So, a thing that could have totally killed me in a couple years if I hadn't done anything didn't, and I only knew that anything was amiss because it was bleeding a little bit.
(Moral of the story is go to the doctor if you notice something like that. Most of the time, it'll just be a hemorrhoid or something; if it's not, that's probably the only warning you're going to get.)
This has made me more aware of my own mortality than I care to be, even though it was successfully dealt with. I too would love if cancer-fighting technology were more advanced, or if we could just edit those genes that put some of us at higher out of our genomes.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/28/well/live/colon-and-recta...
It has made me thought about my own mortality, but that only occupies half my thoughts. The other half are preoccupied with this sickening reality that our 21st century technology really isn't all that great.
Sure, we are getting better at beating cancer. Immunotherapy seems especially promising. On the other hand though, it's almost maddening how many people develop a mild pain and find out it's late stage cancer after a doctor's appointment. Had they ignored said mild pain it could've progressed to the point where they're terminally ill.
Facebook can probably build an elaborate psychological profile based on my online habits. It knows my mind. How strange that we can't hope to know our own bodies so well.