Hunger Strike

I am planning a hunger strike for chronic illness. The planning will take some time -- there's no point in doing it if I don't get any publicity -- but I can't stand how invisible we are any more.

From today's LA Times:

Chronic illnesses like cancer, heart disease and diabetes have reached global epidemic proportions and now cause more deaths than all other diseases combined, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday.

In its first worldwide report on so-called non-communicable diseases, or NCDs, the United Nations health body said the conditions caused more than half of all deaths in 2008 and pose a greater threat than infectious diseases such as malaria, HIV and tuberculosis (TB) -- even in many poorer countries.

"The rise of chronic noncommunicable diseases presents an enormous challenge," WHO Director-General Dr Margaret Chan, who launched the report at a meeting in Moscow, said in a statement.

"For some countries, it is no exaggeration to describe the situation as an impending disaster; a disaster for health, for society, and most of all for national economies," she said.

NCDs, which include heart disease, lung diseases, cancer and diabetes, accounted for 36 million, or 63 percent, of the 57 million deaths worldwide in 2008.

And this story appeared ONLY in the LA Times. What the hell is wrong with us as a society when we care so little for our sick? I can't stand it any more. Jennifer

P.S. -- Just to be totally clear, I am not trying to commit suicide. If you drink water and take salt during a fast, you can go for a good 60 days -- people have gone way longer, and the length of time you'll be able to handle is longer the more body weight you have on you, which means I could easily go 60 days. But I think I would shoot for 30 days. Hopefully, that would be long enough to make my point.

I just wanted to be clear that I'm not doing this without researching, without medical approval, and familial approval. J