The only alternative: Stay healthy!

Only believe the surveys you created yourself. Old student wisdom, and still true. And that's the case again in this case. The DAK (a German health insurance company) found that 75% are afraid of getting cancer.

The survey and the corresponding results are more about fear than preventative education. And when I read that an incredible 88% are satisfied with their health, 81% exercise regularly, and 80% pay attention to a healthy diet and drink less alcohol, then you can rest easy, eh? You could sit back and relax.

Unfortunately, that's not the case. I just hope the people in charge at the health insurance company don't draw conclusions from such statistics because the reality is different. The question is, who actually drinks all that alcohol? Who eats the "garbage" that's labelled as food, and who smokes all those cigarettes? Where are all the fat people, for example? A statistic from last week revealed that 65% of workers are plagued by stress and burnout.

So forget such figures; they either serve only as bad entertainment, accompany cuts in the healthcare system, or combine advertising offers.

The problem is different. While 10 years ago, the majority of hospital patients were admitted with "only" one serious and often fatal illness (circulatory system, cancer, obesity, dementia, diabetes) and were discharged after a successful recovery, in another 10 years, things will look dramatically different unless a 180-degree turnaround occurs.

Patients will be admitted with triple illnesses. Diagnosis: cancer, obesity, and circulatory system disease. The problem will then be that these patients will be so old that they can't simply be discharged, because where would they go then? If things continue like this, there won't be enough nursing home beds.

Those responsible for politics and the healthcare system are lying to themselves about this problem, probably hoping that others will make these decisions for them later. The only answer we can give is to live healthy lives ourselves! Above all, live now and live independently.