Last night’s State of the Union address from President Obama covered a lot of ground in a relatively short period of time. Nearly none of that covered health-related issues, mainly because it wasn’t politically expedient in an election year with job fears and emotions over tax fairness.

There were a few passing comments on health issues, none in any real depth. However, one really struck home with me:

“I will not back down from protecting our kids from mercury pollution, or making sure that our food is safe and our water is clean,” said the President.

While many of us are eating too much junky processed food and not enough healthy natural food, water, the vary foundation of life on Earth is being threatened. It’s an issue that gets next to no coverage anywhere in relation to other environmental problems. But it’s the one problem that, if it got out control, would be the quickest route to our demise.

About 70 percent of the Earth’s surface is covered by water. More than 60 percent of an adult’s body is made up of it. Without it, you will die in about three days. It’s pretty important.
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There’s always a bit of political grandstanding that goes on during a president’s state of the union address, but it is especially ratcheted up during an election year. This is one of the key moments for President Obama to make the case for his re-election. That means he is most likely to talk about the economy and various issues surrounding it.

Insiders say topics will include the continuing housing crisis, jobs, and fixing a tax and financial system that many think is unfairly rigged for the richest few.

What, if anything, will be said about the state of healthcare in the U.S.? It seems doubtful much of anything, other than a cursory mention, given what most people will be voting on this year.

Much of the address will be targeting the all-important voting block of the middle class. Many of them are certainly struggling with their pocketbooks… but many are also without healthcare. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the number of people without health insurance coverage was 49.9 million in 2010.
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What do you do when some of the healthiest foods on the planet, fish and shellfish, actually become dangerous to eat? Of course, the dangers of mercury exposure are much more extensive and complex than that, and for that reason the Obama Administration has announced its praise for new protective measures to reduce mercury and other toxic air emissions.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has finished our first national standards to reduce toxins. Power plants are the largest man-made source of toxic air emissions such as mercury, arsenic, acid gas, and cyanide in the United States.

When mercury is not emitted naturally from such sources as volcanoes, it comes from human activities like manufacturing or burning coal for fuel.

When mercury falls from the sky through precipitation (rain or snow) into bodies of water like lakes and streams. From here, it works its way up the food chain. Bacteria in soils and sediments convert mercury to methylmercury, at which point it is consumed by small aquatic plants and animals.
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Today is President Obama’s 50th birthday. While it may make many of us cringe that we have hit the half century mark, think about what you would feel like if you were president. The highest office in the land is notorious for aging the men who have held it. All you have to do is look at pictures of President Obama from four short years ago.

Thing is, being 50 these days isn’t so rough if you take care of yourself.

“These days, we consider men in their 50s to be young at heart – literally and mentally,” says William Pollack, Ph.D., of the Harvard medical school.

If you think you’re too busy for fitness, try being the leader of the free world and keeping a healthy lifestyle. So how does the busiest person with the most stressful job on the planet stay fit? It’s always a good idea to work out first thing in the morning. It gives you an energy boost the rest of the day and less opportunity to make excuses. It just so happens that when you’re President of the United States, first thing in the morning is nearly a requirement, so it works perfectly for Obama.

“Most of my workouts have to come before my day starts,” says President Obama. “I probably get in about 45 minutes of exercise.”
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In March of 2010, the Congress passed a set of health care reforms, spearheaded by President Obama, that had failed to be written into law by previous administrations. Yet as soon as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was signed by the president, calls for its repeal immediately sounded from Republicans. A compromise for some, a huge victory for some and a setback for others, the health care bill remains the center of a fierce debate. The government’s role in health care is about more than helping citizens stay healthy, it is closely tied to the underlying ideals about how the country should run.

Both sides of the aisle agree that further reforms are needed to reduce the cost of government-funded health care, but it is the extent and form of these changes that is widely debated. Health care is poised to be a major point of contention in the upcoming presidential debates, particularly among the candidates vying for the Republican nomination.

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