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"we may need to rethink what is regarded as ‘normal’ in relation to our health"

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  1. chdot
    Admin

    "

    As well as presenting data and evidence, the CMO also comments on overarching trends. This year, information in the report suggests that we may need to rethink what is regarded as ‘normal’ in relation to our health and our society. For example, while some people drink more alcohol than is good for their health, many people drink very little or don’t drink at all. While many people think that cycling is dangerous because we hear of deaths on the road, cycling is usually a safe and healthy thing to do but the benefits of cycling don’t make the headlines.

    ...

    Active travel (walking and cycling) is good for our health, and more should be done to make it even safer, which will encourage more people to travel this way.

    "

    https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/chief-medical-officer-annual-report-surveillance-volume-2012

    Posted 11 years ago #

  2. Instography
    Member

    You know how I hate to be pedantic but if most people are now overweight or obese then that state doesn't need to be normalised. It is normal already. That's what normal means.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  3. kaputnik
    Moderator

    Norms, damned norms and statistics.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  4. crowriver
    Member

    At least nobody has used the dreaded Americanism 'normalcy' yet.

    If and when the news reports start using that term, it will be time to give up. Until then, remember 'less' is NOT the same as 'fewer'. You can have less money, less time, and less energy than someone else. You cannot have less shoes, less items in your shopping basket, or less miles driven in your car. If your quantity of things is divisible by one, the term is FEWER. Got it?

    Posted 11 years ago #

  5. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    @crowriver

    Fewer moneys. Money is countable.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  6. gembo
    Member

    Now this forum can get a bit pedantic so just to be clear OED grammar has it as LESS when doesn't have a plural or can't be counted.

    Money as in how much money have you got to buy this castelli Gabba, is not plural

    How many different monies are there in the world - would be a different usage, innit? Also would use currencies in that sentence.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  7. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    I quite like the American usage 'How many dollars did you make this year?' Money is surely both plural and countable.

    Speaking of pedantry, does a null subject take a singular or plural verb?

    'None of them has made any dollars' or 'None of them have made any dollars'?

    Posted 11 years ago #

  8. sallyhinch
    Member

    A grammar pedant writes:

    There's an easy way to remember less and fewer: if you say iS you say leSS, if you say aRe you say feweR:

    There is less pollution in Scotland than in London
    There are fewer bikes in London than in the Netherlands

    Curiously, the Netherlands is treated as a singular, but let's not go there.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  9. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    "Netherlands is treated as a singular, but let's not go there."

    The first time I've seen anyone advocating not going to Holland on a cycling forum.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  10. gembo
    Member

    IWRATS, I can see what you are saying about Money but I think it might be a super ordinate singular concept (I am making this term up). Same as time.

    This pounds shillings and pence are plural as are hours minutes and seconds but put them together and what do you get? bibbity bobbity boo.

    money - good Beatles song and covered well by Flying Lizards

    time - good Tom Waits song, probably with Keith Richards on guitar but I would need to check that.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  11. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    @gembo

    The mere mention of Tom Waits means that the rest of my working day will be to the strains of 'The Piano Has Been Drinking'

    And the owner is a mental midget
    With the I.Q. of a fencepost
    Cause the piano has been drinking
    The piano has been drinking...not me...

    Posted 11 years ago #

  12. cc
    Member

    'None of them has made any dollars' or 'None of them have made any dollars'?

    "None" stands for "not one" so it'd be "has", as in "Not one of them has made any dollars".

    Posted 11 years ago #

  13. gembo
    Member

    The Piano Has Been drinking contains some very sage advice, I will have to consult album but will return......

    And you can't find your waitress
    With a Geiger counter
    And she hates you and your friends
    And you just can't get served
    Without her

    Always best to be very civil and polite to bar staff if you want served, wish I could have stuck to that in my drinking days....

    Also forgot another favourite line

    Cause the bouncer is a sumo wrestler
    Cream puff Casper milk toast

    When I saw the great Tom in 1987 playhouse gig I think he sang

    And you can't find your waitress
    Not even with a Geiger counter

    Scans better. Will now also have a Tom Waits day, what's not to like?

    Posted 11 years ago #

  14. gembo
    Member

    Old Bushmills I stagger
    You bury the dagger

    sorry, will try to limit this

    Posted 11 years ago #

  15. EddieD
    Member

    I don't think money is usually countable - cash is, certainly, but money is really a generic term for medium of exchange or wealth.

    I was always told in my student days that the association had plenty of money, in terms of stock etc, but no cash.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  16. wingpig
    Member

    I suppose the difference between "he made a lot of money" and "he made lots of money" would be determined by how many money-making events were successfully executed.

    Fewer quanta. Less quantity.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  17. gembo
    Member

    Love that Tom Waits will play Dublin and Edinburgh Playhouse only in these small islands abutting the coast of continental Europe. Also possibly apocryphal story of guy taking bottle of Bushmills (I think to the 1985 gig) to Playhouse in the early evening, handing it in, being told to linger and then being ushered through to have a drink with Tom. also that for the last gig at playhouse couple of years back, you needed a passport to get in to circumvent the touts. £75 was out of my price bracket but I heard the gig was good. I used to sing Hang Down Your Head from Raindogs as lullaby to my crying baby son as I held him to my chest and walked him round his bedroom.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  18. slowcoach
    Member

    back to the CMO's report: "Indeed, research suggests that the overall health benefits of cycling are 7 times greater than the risks."
    "more should be done to make it even safer, which will encourage more people to travel this way" - how much safer does it need to be to encourage more people?
    Is safety just used as an excuse for not cycling instead of laziness?

    Posted 11 years ago #

  19. gembo
    Member

    If we must return to topic than I agree.

    I have fairly serious chest infection at the moment, likely requiring operation. Several of my nearest and dearest blaming year round cycling. Granted it looks like I was still cycling with the Empyema developing inside my pleural linings.

    I informed the very excellent consultant of this situation and he said - you should keep cycling the health benefits far exceed the risks.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  20. fimm
    Member

    Sorry to hear that, gembo.

    Talk about thread drift - this one ended up somewhere near the Falklands...

    Actually, what I was going to say was about normal - isn't the point that because the average person is overweight, people's perception of what a "normal" weight is has become skewed. It is back to the "everybody does it" thing - if "everybody" is that shape, how can that shape be unhealthy? But it is.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  21. Cyclingmollie
    Member

    Sorry to hear that gembo. Get well soon.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  22. amir
    Member

    The terminology "normal" is a little slack but not that bad - it doesn't need to be in relation to the current population. Bit like "significant" - can mean what you like.

    I'm not sure what wording would be better - healthy? ideal? reference range? Target? Anyway - it does seem like a good idea to have an ideal that's independent of the population in this case - which is more or less what the CMO says. cf absolute and relative poverty?

    Posted 11 years ago #

  23. cc
    Member

    Get well soon gembo.

    Wasn't there a BMJ study some years ago which said that drivists take in a lot more polluted air than people on bicycles, and that all things considered cycling was almost twenty times as healthy as going by car?

    Posted 11 years ago #

  24. amir
    Member

    Get well soon gembo!

    Posted 11 years ago #

  25. gembo
    Member

    @cc think there was such a study and maybe was to do with particulates blowing about when cycling but being trapped inside the vehicle if driving?

    Very recent study showing cycling helped reduce likelihood of getting the flu but sadly I was not normal in that study.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  26. wingpig
    Member

    Some of the exposure-to-particulates studies' summaries remembered to mention cyclists' potentially greater respiratory throughput compared to someone sitting still in a motor vehicle or walking but I don't think any have adjusted the amount of air sampled in each position to take account of it, possibly because you'd then have to introduce loads of assumptions about speed/fitness in relation to the sample areas' topologies.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  27. kaputnik
    Moderator

    One of the issues with being in a car is not location of vents etc, it's that modern air-con means that you are in a slightly pressurised environment, with external air constantly being forced into the passenger compartment thus concentrating particulate matter. As a cyclist you're only really exposed to the ambient levels.

    There was some frankly idiotic advice on the BBC News website today about how to "cope" with the smog issue in England. It suggested you drive down quieter side streets instead of "clogged" arterial routes, as these are less polluted and therefore the air is cleaner. I couldn't but stop tweeting them that the net effect is just to relocate the emission source (and congestion) to the "clean" areas. It's as if they believe you can somehow out-drive your own pollution or outrun your own shadow. There was no advice about considering leaving the car at home and taking public transport, walking or cycling... It did suggest you turn off your air con and open the windows though.

    Posted 11 years ago #

  28. steveo
    Member

    I would have thought the air-con particulate filter would have helped?

    Posted 11 years ago #

  29. sallyhinch
    Member

    My husband had empyema a few years back - very nasty, they had to poke holes in him twice to drain the infection. They also threatened him with surgery to clear the scar tissue but later decided it wasn't worth it and he's made a full recovery. It certainly wasn't year-round cycling that did it - he is very much a fair weather cyclist - but the smoking probably didn't help. On the whole, however, the docs were inclined to blame an ill-advised trip to London, and he's avoided the place ever since

    Posted 11 years ago #

  30. gembo
    Member

    Yes Sally, I have had holes poked and fluid drained. But pool of infected fluid had split, believe the term was loculated. Then was instructed to walk about with the bucket and tube contraption. I did this all weekend to no avail. I was the only ambulant patient in the ward. Was thirty years younger than everyone else. Until day 5 when couple of younger guys came in with pretty serious stuff. I don't smoke, but had it in my head that viral infection not going to get antibiotics when I should have gone to GP straight away. I don't smoke so looks like karma not great. Hopefully scarring thing will go same way as your husband, will find out Monday.

    Posted 11 years ago #

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