Heard of Hippocrates? Yes, the Greek philosopher, considered the 'Father of Western Medicine' whose oath ' to help and not to harm' by which all the doctors at least swear by, though not many may abide by, as is proven by the Delhi blast and the plot it unravels.
Well, Hippocrates opined that "old people have fewer diseases than the young." Quite a prescient soul! Just look around to find abundant proof of his axiom. Our P.M. in his mid-seventies is much healthier than many of his citizens in their early thirties!
Indeed the threshold of 'dis-ease' is lowering like anything, while life expectancy is rising! Every family has at least two super seniors in their eighties. The young, however, are prone to all sorts of dis-eases of body and mind. In a college, for example, there are so many students who casually tell you that 'depression' is an epidemic! Why, schools have to have psychologists!
As for physical distress, high blood pressure, diabetes, why, even heart attacks are targetting the young in their late twenties or early thirties so much so that just yesterday on my screen popped an ad for mobile aided ECG machine with the tagline about the heart attack frenzy ASAP!
Why is it so? Yes, life is tough. Tensions about degree, about job, about security given the AI invasion, terrible competition, the list is endless in the public sphere! In the private space, relationships are a trouble. Divorces, no longer a taboo, are an easy solution to even a minor disagreement. Often there is not any sibling support as parents age as many double income families of the earlier generation often preferred an only child!
If the support systems are wearing thin, personal discipline has gone for a toss, too. Waking up any time, lack of enough sleep, excessive exercise (in the chase of 'packs') in gyms or no exercise at all, drinking 'protein shakes', eating excessively spicy Chinese or fat filled pizzas, drinking aerated drinks, not to forget liqueur, 'doing' drugs, the 'life style' of the young is such that dis-ease would just fall flat for it!
Quote of the day: "The only way to keep your health," quips Mark Twain, "is to eat what you don't want, drink what you don't like, and do what you would rather not."
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