Richard Jackson, Public Health Officionado

Goodness! My blipping has taken back-seat to thesis writing. How silly of me! Today was a good business-mixed-hobby day, as I got to see Richard Jackson speak about the interrelationship of the built environment (buildings, roads, parks) and human health. With the obesity and diabetes epidemics as they currently are in the US, it is rather unfair we blame a third of our population for "lack of control" or laziness or whatever else we could point our fingers at.

Instead, insists Jackson (and I agree), we should look at the society that made it so- and not just Coca-Cola, Monsanto, and McDonalds, but also at the physical layout of our cities. Can you walk or bike to your work, to a grocery store, to a safe park or playground? Do you have to commute long hours in cortisol-inducing traffic because there is no good public-transportation alternative? Have we isolated poor communities and immigrant neighborhoods from healthy living and civic engagement by putting up impassable freeways and slowly bleeding neighborhoods of healthy food choices and safe places to exercise and play?

Signs point to yes. So what are you going to do about it?