The “Smoking Alcoholic” syndrome of Czechs / Syndrom kouriciho alkoholika v CR

A recently published study called The Facts About the Czech Health Care uncovers a disturbing statistics about the Czech lifestyle. First of all, the alcohol consumption is higher only in Hungary, France and Luxembourg. You are probably thinking, “well, a little bit of beer here and there is not going to kill anybody..”. Sure, but if you add the second sad statistics of this study, which is the fact that every fourth Czech is a habitual smoker, then situation becomes a little more serious. Maybe if the eating habits were more promising yet the study points out that “the fruit and vegetable consumption in the Czech Republic is almost the lowest in all of Europe”. The scientist go further on, predicting if this trend continues into the future by the year of 2010 every fifth Czech will end up being obese. What is the most common cause of death in the Czech Republic?

• more than 50% of deaths are caused by heart diseases
• 2nd most common death cause is cancer

The article continues further on claiming that Czechs don’t make a big deal about all these depressing statistical numbers and rely on their health care; if they get sick, the doctor will cure them….

I remember this “Smoking Alcoholic Syndrome” very vividly from my own experience; when I was in high school my friends and I would save up our lunch money to go to the closest coffee shop where – from 12pm to 1pm – all we did was smoked, drank wine/coffee/beer and acted cool….

CZ: Studie Fakta o ceskem zdravotnictvi ukazuje, ze se Cesi zdatne probojovavaji na vrchol zebricku co se tyce zdravi (nebo spise “ne-zdravi”). Co se tyce alkoholu, jeho vyssi spotreba se ukazuje jen v Madarsku, Francii a Luxembursku. Vy si asi rikate, “no trosku vinecka nam neuskodi…”. Kdyz k tomu ovsem jeste pridate fakt, ze kazdy 4. cech take pravidelne kouri, uz to tak nevinne nevypada. Kdyby ta zivotosprava byla alespon zdrava, ale statisticky pruzkum ukazuje, ze “spotreba ovoce a zeleniny je v Cesku temer nejnizsi v Evrope”. Pokud tento trend bude pokracovat do budoucnosti, v roce 2010 bude kazdy 5. Cech obezni. Na co Cesi nejcasteji umiraji?

• vice nez 50% umrti je onemocneni srdce a cev
• Druhou nejcastejsi pricinou umrti je rakovina

Cesi si z toho ale nedelaji hlavu; pry ale spolehaji na to, ze je zdravotnictvi vyleci v pripade, ze onemocni.

Ja si tento syndrom “kouriciho alkoholika” presne pamatuji; jako stredoskolaci bychom si schranovali penize na obedy a za ne si pak kupovali nejen cigarety, ale take alkohol (neboli “chlast” jak tomu ti mladi rikaji ;). A tuto “dvojici” jsme vesele poradali o polednich prestavkach…

Source: http://www.ceskenoviny.cz/magazin/zdravi/index_view.php?id=274101