Generally I've been avoiding political discussions like the plague, but I feel I have to respond here.
WoN-
...many (but not all) medical doctors don't like for people to do things that keep them healthy or are preventative because they don't make money if people don't get sick...we don't practice "health care" in our society, we practice "sick care".
That's like asserting that the medical profession has been supressing a cure for cancer to line our pockets. There are zealots who believe that, too. Please believe me - neither statement is true.
To force the comment into the form of a word-post:
I would posit that "many-but-not-all" sounds as though you mean "half or more." If this is indeed your opinion, you have been lax in your evaluation of physicians, who deserve as much investigation as you gave to allegations about diets. Or else you've been very unfortunate in your exposure to physicians. I'll accept your characterization as applying to an occasional doctor, but most of the ones I know would much rather earn ourselves more personal time, by getting our patients to do what's good for them, than make more money. It's a losing battle much of the time.
Oversimplifying greatly: we may sometimes - maybe even often - seem to treat sickness to the exclusion of promoting healthful lifestyles, as you say, but that's partly from frustration (unspoken feeling, because it wouldn't be diplomatic to say it aloud: Why are you coming to me for help when you persist in doing things you KNOW are making you worse?) and partly because there's hardly enough time to deal with the immediate problems as is. Remember the alligators? "When you're up to your ears in alligators it's hard to remember that your original task was to drain the swamp..."
--speaking from the trenches: practicing cardiologist; office and hospital care; work only sixty hours a week (my practice is a small one)
