Health
The Kuna have been shown to have a low average blood pressure (BP, 110/70 mm Hg), and, do not experience the age-related increase in blood pressure that is common in Western society (Hollenberg et al. 1997). More importantly, death rates from cardiovascular disease and cancer, the #1 and #2 causes of death in the US are rare in the Kuna. Between 2000 to 2004, on the mainland of Panama, Bayard et al. (2007) reported that for every 100,000 residents, 83 died from cardiovascular disease (CVD), and 68 died from cancer. In contrast, per 100,000 Kuna, these death rates were 9 for CVD and 4 for cancer. One possible explanation for the improved health of the Kuna, relative to their mainland Panamanian counterparts is that the Kuna drink 30-40 oz. of flavanol-rich cocoa per day (http://voices.yahoo.com/kuna-cocoa-optimal-way-decrease-blood-pressure-11583580.html?cat=70).
Read more about this topic: Kuna People
Famous quotes containing the word health:
“To be stupid and selfish and to have good health are the three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking, the others are useless.”
—Gustave Flaubert (1821–1880)
“In the continual enterprise of trying to guide appropriately, renegotiate with, listen to and just generally coexist with our teenage children, we ourselves are changed. We learn even more clearly what our base-line virtues are. We listen to our teenagers and change our minds about some things, stretching our own limits. We learn our own capacity for flexibility, firmness and endurance.”
—Jean Jacobs Speizer. Ourselves and Our Children, by Boston Women’s Health Collective, ch. 4 (1978)
“In our great concern about the mental health of children, however, we have overlooked the mental health of mothers. They have been led to believe that their children’s needs must not be frustrated, and therefore all of their own normal angers, the normal ambivalences of living, are not permissible. The mother who has “bad” feelings toward her child is a bad mother.”
—Elaine Heffner (20th century)