It was medical news that attracted readers around the world: A new study shows that more women who have developed cancer in one breast are opting for a preventive double mastectomy — even if the best scientific evidence shows they’re not at higher risk for getting the disease in the second breast.
If, God forbid, you come down with cancer, pray your case is handled in the same manner as Maria Shaffer’s.
It is the leading reason people go to the doctor — and the Institute of Medicine, part of the National Academy of Sciences, reports it affects 100 million American adults, more than the total affected by heart disease, cancer and diabetes combined.
Two years ago, Johns Hopkins surgeon Marty Makary penned a Wall Street Journal piece, “How to Stop Hospitals from Killing Us,” which contained a paragraph that was at once sickening and a call to action.
As she finished the hot dog and Baby Ruth bar she was eating inside the convenience store, the rotund young mother made breakfast for her two little ones.
Civil rights, feminism, the anti-Vietnam War movement, gay rights, rights for the disabled. Given what’s happened in those areas during the six decades baby boomers have monopolized the nation’s cultural, political and economic landscape, it’s not surprising that many researchers characterize boomers, and that includes me, as positive social and political rabble-rousers.
It’s happening increasingly in American life — men acting as caregivers.
