Category: Health (Page 2 of 8)

Technology won’t save us from old folks.

November 15, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

WSJ: Old Age Will Be Different in the Robotic Age

Machines could soon help elders get out of bed, bathe them, even provide them with emotional support.

I always figured this problem would be solved by the Japanese inventing competent Elder-bots, the Chinese making cheap knock-offs and an American start-up company offering free robots that tended to the feeble as it harvested confidential medical information to defraud Medicaid. That won’t happen.

Enough with the fluoride debate.

November 13, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

Efforts to remove fluoride from drinking water make steady progress amid mainstream headwinds

A growing movement to remove fluoride from public drinking water is gaining steam, fueled by modern research and safety concerns.

Everybody has teeth and billions of dollars goes to medical research. It shouldn’t be difficult to get an answer on fluoride and clearly explain the results.

Being alone isn’t so bad.

November 12, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

RCI: Americans Are Increasingly Alone, But Are They Really Lonely?

In 2023, then-U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy released a bombshell report, “Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation,” that painted a bleak picture of citizens feeling “isolated, invisible, and insignificant.” Most provocatively, it stated that perhaps half of Americans face a personal crisis of aloneness that poses health risks “similar to that caused by smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day.”

The “Crisis of Loneliness” issue has been in the news for over a decade. It has always sounded phony to me. How does anyone gauge the loneliness of others?

Workout routine

November 5, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

There is just no way to make this look good. Unless I get a tape worm from Sparky or deer wasting disease, I will remain a fat guy.¹

It helps to say that I am famine resistant, but the photos don’t lie. I could phony them up like the fat-arsed social media girls, but that defeats the purpose of having a record of our workout progress.

Mental health challenges are an important part of my identity.

October 5, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

Mental Illness, Political Ideology, and Holding False Beliefs

Our recent Skeptic Research Center survey of over 3,000 Americans found that 67% of GenZ men and 72% of GenZ women (i.e., those born between 1997-2006) believe “mental health challenges are an important part of my identity.”

That doesn’t sound healthy.

Science says that chocolate is good for you.

September 28, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

Effect of cocoa flavanol supplementation for the prevention of cardiovascular disease events,

I’ve been buying this nutritional supplement from Aldi for years.

Cocoa extract supplementation did not significantly reduce total cardiovascular events among older adults but reduced CVD death by 27%.

Finally, nutritional science has some good news. The study looks legit.

The study was conducted by Brigham and Women’s Hospital. There were 12,666 women over 65 years old, and 8776 men over 60 years old in a double-blind, placebo controlled study. A 27% reduction in death by cardiovascular disease is substantial.

Physics Class, September 11th.

September 11, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

Whatever can happen, will happen, if you wait long enough.

That is an operating principle in modern physics. There is a 1 in 6000 chance that a nickel dropped on to a table top, will rest on the edge of the coin. If you dropped a nickel every 10 seconds, within 17 hours, you’d expect a nickel to land on the edge. It’s a very unlikely event, but it will happen.

Vaccines should not be controversial.

September 5, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

The Florida GOP ending vaccine mandates is playing with fire

Why is this controversial? Parents can get their children vaccinated. By not making vaccinations mandatory, pharmaceutical companies and the medical community will have to be honest and transparent about the benefits and risks. It’s shady when the government assumes that they care more than parents do.

Men don’t go to the doctor.

September 3, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

NYT: What Does It Take to Get Men to See a Doctor?

The Cutler Center is one of the few clinical spaces trying to tackle the stubborn problem of men’s lack of engagement with America’s health care system.

Right now, men in the United States, whether infants or elders, are more likely to die at younger ages than their female counterparts. Male life expectancy at birth is currently 75.8 years — 5.3 years less than it is for women.

Weak men make hard times.

August 25, 2025 / Richard Nestoff / 0 Comments

It’s embarrassing that the next mayor of New York City can’t lift 135 lbs, while a retired teacher in Ohio can bench 180 lbs. My brother and I are doing two sets of 12, at 140 lbs.

More embarrassing for Mamdani is that he made the attempt without knowing for certain that he can lift the weight. Not a good look.