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The national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has issued “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly” for Men’s Health Week (going on now), and in Arizona, bad and ugly outweigh good.
The CDC says in its report that 73 percent of Arizona men are obese or overweight. And they rank worse than the average American guy when it comes to high blood pressure, stroke, and heavy drinking.
There is some good, though. More than 85,000 adult males quit smoking (tobacco) last year.
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And while Arizona men have the lowest overall rate of cancer in the country (this includes prostate cancer), there’s a “kind of double edged sword,” says Mary Ehlert, marketing director of Tobacco and Chronic Disease Prevention.
The turnout for men’s health screenings and annual checkups is drastically low, with hundreds of thousands skipping out.
“It’s very common for women to be the managers of the household and make sure the husband and kids get to the doctor,” says Ehlert. “A lot of men are afraid of what they’re going to find out. Or they don’t have the time and don’t make it a priority.”
“Put aside your fears and ‘man-up’ — find out what’s going on inside,” says Wayne Tormala, men’s health coordinator for the Arizona Department of Health Services.
There you have it, gentlemen: either ditch your veggie-hating, whiskey-guzzling, anti-exercising ways for more health-conscience habits, or succumb to the inevitable consequences of a carefree lifestyle.
