Plan Your Post Pandemic Health Today

As we are running out of days in 2022, the worldwide daily new cases of COVID-19 are fluctuating around 500,000/day and have since just after Labor Day. Even daily serious and critical cases have fallen under 50,000/day since April 2022 and are trending downward. Is this a predictor of nearness to post pandemic enjoyment?

Some days have been slightly higher, and more days have been significantly lower (up to 30% lower). https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ The worldwide daily death rate has declined to under 2,000/day during the last four months of 2022.

Is the post pandemic era about to arrive? What is the definition of a post-COVID-19 pandemic world? I define it as the absence of concern for viral transmission, the anxiety of being isolated or infecting others, the freedom to have close relationships, and probably cause to believe the future is better than ever.

Worldwide, since the beginning of recording pandemic-related deaths, the survivability of the pandemic virus has been 99%. However, most of those deaths were in the first year. If we calculate the latest worldwide daily deaths over the last three months compared to the number of new cases over that same time, the survivability rate is over 99.7%. Is that really a pandemic?

New Post Pandemic World

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2020/11/our-post-pandemic-world-and-whats-likely-to-hang-round/ There are many speculations about our ‘new post pandemic world.’ Many businesses have closed, and reductions in force are being made routinely as we approach the New Year.

Videoconferencing and working from home have become the norm. Some areas of the country are more open than others.

The United States pandemic statistics closely follow worldwide numbers.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/ Since Labor Day of 2022, the daily new cases of COVID-19 have remained under 60,000/day, with several weeks under 40,000/day. In addition, daily deaths have remained historically low for the past six months, averaging under 500/day and several weeks under 400/day, yielding an average survival rate of 99.7% in the United States.

Is a disease with a 99+% survival rate a pandemic? That is the question for health professionals. I am concerned about my health and what I can do that will make it better despite living in a pandemic world.

My definition of health is a state of complete mental, physical, emotional, and social well-being – not just the absence of disease or infirmity. Likewise, my definition of wellness that accompanies health is reaching one’s fullest potential regarding emotional, environmental, financial, intellectual, occupational, physical, social, and spiritual fitness.

How can we maximize our health and wellness to be miles ahead when arriving in the post pandemic promised land? I think the first critical question to answer is, how healthy are you today?

Current Assessment

https://blog.corehealth.global/how-to-evaluate-the-effectiveness-of-your-health-and-wellness-program Lots of good information in this link. Other things important to me are the annual assessments of my health. I have not missed an annual physical since 1968. For 31 years, I had annual flight physicals in the Navy. After I retired, I continued my annual physicals with my general practitioner. Nowadays, I have regular visits to my dermatologist, cardiologist, and ophthalmologist.

What current medications are we on today? Can the dosage be reduced or eliminated with other treatments? If we do not ask, we will always be on prescription meds. Some medications block a specific pathway for a disease; over time, the dosage must be increased, or another medicine must be prescribed.

I research the human body at the cellular level looking for cause-and-effect relationships. When we can identify a cause, the chances of successfully addressing the solution improve dramatically.
Along with our current meds, we need to assess our current weight, body-fat percentages, stress levels, sleep patterns, current habits that could impact our health (smoking/alcohol/stress), media attention (a significant stressor), anxiety levels, and overall situational awareness of how well we are doing. Unlike many corporate assessment programs, leading and lagging indicators for health are mostly unknown.

Diet & Health

https://www.cdc.gov/healthyweight/healthy_eating/index.html  Most of the time, when we think about our health, it usually falls into two categories – diet and exercise. What do you eat, and how often? Is it balanced nutritionally? What supplements do you take and why? Do you track your calories, and how much control do you have over the foods you eat? What are you missing nutritionally? What aspects of your lifestyle need tweaking? There are many questions that we never address.

Sometimes, we blame it on genetics. However, epigenetically speaking, around five percent of genetics might be outside our control. Most of us recognize stress in our lives, but we do not realize how much we hold on to and never release it. Over time, it can become a health problem. What kinds of stress management do you practice?

Getting Healthy Sleep

https://www.healthline.com/health/healthy-sleep#TOC_TITLE_HDR_1 Sleep is the time for our bodies to recuperate and repair, allowing our internal organs the time to relax. How do you assess your sleep? Are you getting enough hours? Yes, might be the answer, but are those hours considered quality sleep? There are great suggestions in the link above.

Many of us have problems drifting off to sleep and then have difficulty transitioning to being fully awake. Stress can be a contributing cause of poor sleep. Anxiety can also be a cause of low-quality sleep. How is your focus? Are you irritable, fatigued, or have headaches, muscle aches, and stomach aches? How are your relationships? Do you have eating problems? There are many issues that we never consider when evaluating our current health

Conclusion

Alice in Wonderland has a great lesson about planning for our future. When Alice comes to a fork in the road, the advice she gets from the Cheshire Cat is if she does not know where she is going, any road will get her there. The same is true with our health. Do we know where we are and where we want to go?

Maybe today is a good day to figure out the first part – where are you today? Think about what is good and bad and what you need for a better life in the post pandemic world. It will arrive sooner than you think. At least, I hope so. I cannot imagine that we have to have a 99.99% survival rate to be declared post pandemic!

Live Longer & Enjoy Life! – Red O’Laughlin – RedOLaughlin.com