With respect to medicine, the 19th century was about developing a basic understanding of hygiene.  The 20th century was about understanding major diseases and the development of medicines, surgical procedures and analytical technologies to treat them.

Advances in medicine will continue, of course, but the priority for the 21st century, in the developed world at least, is behavior.

If people in developed societies would eat less, consume less alcohol, stop smoking, exercise more and put down their cell phones while driving, it is estimated that health care costs would decline by at least a third.  This is not a fool's errand. The decline in smoking over the last 20 years is proof that behavioral patterns, even deeply ingrained ones, can be positively altered.  It is not written in stone that people must just keep getting heavier or that texting while driving is so addictive that people are somehow incapable of resisting the urge to drive 70 miles an hour while googling directions to a pizza parlor. Self destructive behaviors can change if the government, corporations and the public are aligned.

Recently Mayor Bloomberg attracted considerable attention with his proposal that New York City ban the sale of super sized drinks. Opinion is divided on this initiative and it may or may not be enacted by the City Council. On the other hand, regardless of the outcome of this particular proposal, the debate about the role of government in encouraging or dictating  healthier habits is only getting started.

By the way, for those who think New York City is a less healthy environment in which to live, Mayor Bloomberg points out that city residents enjoy a lifespan that is 2 1/2 years greater than the national average.

The small Baptist college that television preacher Jerry Falwell founded here in 1971 has capitalized on the online education boom to become an evangelical mega-university with global reach. According to this Washington Post article, In the almost six years since Falwell’s death, Liberty University has doubled its student head count — twice.

The number of Americans who claim to have no religious affiliation is the highest it has ever been since data on the subject started being collected in the 1930s, new research from the General Social Survey has found. The report found that, "the unaffiliated say they are not looking for a religion that would be right for them. Overwhelmingly, they think that religious organizations are too concerned with money and power, too focused on rules and too involved in politics." Continue reading here at the Huffington Post

According to this USA Today article and Pauline Sakamoto, member of the Human Milk Banking Association of North America "We're just struggling to keep up...our freezers are empty, but the demand is skyrocketing..." More new moms are using another mother's donated breast milk to feed their babies. Why are the numbers up? Because more hospitals are using donor milk for pre-term infants and the internet. "Before, with casual sharing, you knew the woman. She might be your sister or somebody you knew really well. In the age of the internet, you only know them by what you read on the computer"

Martini, once favored by Vatican progressives to succeed Pope John Paul II and a prominent voice in the church until his death said "Our culture has aged, our churches are big and empty and the church bureaucracy rises up, our rituals and our cassocks are pompous." Continue reading here 

The human brain can’t accurately gauge when an object has doubled or even tripled in size, according to this New York Times article. This inability to judge what is an appropriate portion size may be contributing to our current obesity crisis.