Non-Stop Till Full Stop

The life expectancy of an Indian had gone up – impressively – from 42 years in 1960 to 66 in 2011. This is a commendable achievement, coming within half a century. Many factors have contributed to this – education, better medical care, increase in level of hygiene, awareness of health issues, and most important of all, increase in the nation’s wealth. India’s per capita GDP leaped from $84 to $1159 over the same period, a rise of 13 times and that too, adjusted for inflation.

This simple statistic is not understood in its true perspective by a lot many people, even influential ones. Today’s average person is much more healthier, happier and prosperous than his grand father was, at his age. Alarmists cite a lot of cases trying to prove otherwise – atmospheric pollution, radiation from mobile phone towers (!), fast food, slow food contaminated with chemical pesticides, occupational hazards and increased incidence of fatal diseases like cancer, cardiac and neurotic cases. Of course, these monsters are with us, but haven’t we learned to live with them? Even with all these meddling issues, we are living longer than the previous generations who lived less, even without any of these modern debilities to trouble their way. Don’t forget even for a moment that most of the deadly illnesses afflict aged people and as the number of the aged rises, the absolute number of sick people definitely goes up, but as a percentage of the total population, they are far fewer than it was 50 years ago. Increased and early detection help to save many lives, even though it contributes to the number of patients shooting up.

This is the background. But do everyone need to faithfully follow every health advice to the letter? Say, you are a middle-aged man and a medical examination shows that you have a cardiac or diabetic complication. Naturally, you are condemned to alter your life style, diet, exercise habits, and the entire way of life. In short, you transform to another person in a vain bid to prolong your life expectancy from say, 66 to 71. What is this really worth? When you change one of your ingrained habits like the diet, the ‘you’ inside you have died at that moment and a totally new person is the one trying to live out a few more years, ready to accept any compromise. Isn’t it better to continue as before, and live life to the full – in your own way – and perhaps surrender to the inevitable when it comes?

Our lives are ruled by a combination of chance and our ability to take risks. The process of birth itself is the result of pure chance alone. We, or at least the brain cells dictating these lines, could have originated in one of the lawless states in the under-privileged part of the world and died an early death fighting enemies or diseases. Or, we could have chosen a riskier profession, like the military, where the life expectancy is shorter than the general population. Any of these factors could’ve cut back our life span, so why fret over a disease that threatens a few years at the fag end of life?

Be yourselves and face the situation with courage.

Or, shall we say, non-stop till full stop?