by Jason Unruhe
(new-power.org)
Part of living in the First World is having the satisfaction that medical science will constantly be used to eliminate health problems that arise from your own unwillingness to take care of yourself. We with the most economic privilege in the world eat the worst food possible out of mere convenience poisoning ourselves. We deliberately cause harm to our own bodies via our desire to make things easy. Then when we suffer the health effects we make the global supply of medical equipment, research potential and manufacturing serve to alleviate us from our own apathy towards our health. This is a prime example: scientists are now working on a pill that would eliminate the need to exercise in order to lose weight.
“Dieters are constantly told that there is no ‘magic pill’ to make them skinny, that they need to watch what they eat and exercise. But researchers at Harvard University think they have found a way to turn bad fat into good, helping people lose weight.
Scientists at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) have taken “the first step toward a pill that can replace the treadmill” when combating obesity, the researchers said in a statement. The team has found two compounds that have the potential to turn white (or “bad”) fat cells into brown (or “good”) fat cells.” [1]
The beneficiaries of imperialism are actually going to the length of creating a pill that would eliminate the need for exercise. We know how to cure obesity. We need to eat the proper food and exercise combating our sedentary lifestyle which has been brought to us via a reduction in manual labour. As it is right now more than one-third (34.9% or 78.6 million) of U.S. adults are obese. The estimated annual medical cost of obesity in the U.S. was $147 billion in 2008 U.S. dollars.[2] That’s $147 billion wasted social value on the lifestyle choices of the First World United States. This is a complete an utter waste as the health problems that require this are entirely avoidable.
Our consumer demand for cheaper and more accessible products and food drives the capitalist system to produce for our wants rather than the world’s needs. We end up stealing for our own pleasure to indulge in unhealthy activity while those with real need lay hungry and dying.
[1] Magic pill for obesity? Harvard scientists working on drug to ‘replace treadmill’, Russia Today
http://rt.com/usa/212903-magic-pill-could-cure-obesity/
[2] Adult Obesity Facts, Centers for Disease Control
http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/adult.html
