One pill makes you taller, one pill makes you small.

Have you watched any TV commercials lately? If so, you most likely have seen several advertising drugs. Drugs of all sorts. Birth control pills that clear your skin, some that make the stresses of the world melt away, some for losing weight, some to change your blood chemistry due to bad habits, some to speed you up and some to slow you down.

Without exception, all the commercials end with a litany of warnings that scare me much worse than the problems they are designed to help! Reminds me of a Saturday Night Live Skit with a twisted ending like the one where the happy couple drives off a cliff.

Apparently, they don't scare most people however. An article that came out today, 5-14-08, by Linda A. Johnson of the Associated Press titled "More Americans are taking prescriptions medications", relates some amazing and startling statistics.

* For the first time, more than half of insured Americans are taking prescriptions for chronic problems.

* The most common taken are to lower blood pressure, cholesterol and triglycerides generally linked to heart disease, obesity and diabetes.

* Medication use for chronic problems was seen in all demographic groups:
- Almost two-thirds of women 20 and older.
- One in four children and teenagers.
- 52 percent of adult men.
- Three out of four people 65 or older.

* Among seniors, 28 percent of women and nearly 22 percent of men take five or more medicines regularly.

* One of the most startling findings is that more children than ever are taking medications for adult problems, like obesity, diabetes and digestion problems.

* Many more Americans now take more mood altering drugs and sleeping pill to deal with the stress of life.

We live in an amazing time where we have the ability to deal with chronic and life threatening problems with medications that have truly transformed our ability to deal with illnesses, that in years past, could have led to early death or relegated us to a life of misery. This has been no small feat and kudos should go out to our cutting edge pharmacological industries.

However, cutting edges can also be dangerous. Now that we have a pill for all ills, why should we worry about our health? Just do what you want and when the red light flashes on our health dashboard, just match the problem with a pill and go on as we were. Kind of like turning up the radio when the brakes squeal...problem solved. That is until we become the happy couple that goes off the cliff.

Remember the old adage, doctor heal thyself? Well that means YOU. And even though you have been pounded with ......eat right......exercise.......don't get fat......take your vitamins........, truer words have never been spoken. It takes a lot of responsibility and will power to do these things, but they can literally save your life, or at least make it a whole lot more enjoyable. You can either exist or enjoy. It is truly your choice.

We really don't have a health care crisis. We have a population that is health clueless and for the most part completely unwilling to take responsibility for their own well being.

As the saying goes, "keep doing what you're doing and you will keep getting what you're getting".