Back to Basics

Now that the pandemic is dying down, it is time for politicians, health administrators, educational advisory boards, and educators to ensure that the future of our children are best equipped to face another pandemic and other crisis' that may come along. If there is anything other than the failure of policies enacted by government in response to the pandemic, is the personal responsibility of investing for the future. As we all know, the Sars-CoV-19 virus disproportionately affected the vulnerable population. People who were young and healthy fared a lot better against the virus than people who were unhealthy, especially those who were obese, morbidly obese, and diabetic. Moreover, older people who were frailer with lowered immune systems were also disproportionately affected.

Much attention has been around the religiosity of the vaccine; although vaccination has its place in protecting certain people in the vulnerable population, it is implausible to keep boosting everyone given that there are no data on long term health effects and it’s not a long-term solution. We have known for a bit of time, more so now, that the non-sterilizing vaccines lose their effectiveness over time and no real efficacy for young healthy individuals to get the shot. We need to be weary of the caroling of the vaccines as it may give children, adolescents, and adults the indication that it is the only solution in the face of a virus.

We need to rethink and go back to the basics of the importance of exercise, eating healthier, getting better sleep, and reducing stress. The benefits relating to these four concepts go beyond improving our immune system in the face of a virus (in which those that did invest their time and energy before the pandemic in improving their health, they had lowered risk of severity of Sars-CoV-19 outcomes). The literature is well known and has been documented quite extensively and can have long lasting implications than better health alone.

To simply put it, healthier individuals perform better on test scores, in work environments and are better equipped at facing challenges in the workforce. Moreover, they are better equipped in fighting illnesses and the reduction in risk of chronic and preventable disease makes them a great asset to any company in different industries as this improves productivity. Overall, the economy benefits by having a healthier population which may in fact reduce the burden on health care system and therefore better allocation of scarce resources with alternative uses. The ripple effect may be unparalleled just by focusing on these four basic concepts.

Especially now that we know the indications of the negative outcomes from lockdowns such as increased obesity rates in Canada, it is ever more important to re-shift our focus back to these four basic concepts. We need to get our children, adolescents, and adults to think about their investments in their health for their future and Canada. Future studies and interventions carried out by public health, educators, and those in positions of authority to do so, must make these four basic concepts the center point so that we can better equip our children for their future.