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Comment by swah | Hacker News Reader

I added this heuristic to my mind "Do not assume you will live until 90" when my dad also passed on his 60s. But he was a smoker. Until then I was thinking all my uncles that died in their 60s was because of heavy drinking (bottle of whisky a day or something)

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I see all these rich-famous people, having all the money for all the best care in the world, dying in 50s-60s and I get more and more anxious.

Healthcare doesn't do very much compared to not doing the unhealthy things in the first place, and being rich lets you buy a lot of unhealthy things.

Healthcare can buy you regular screenings to catch problem much earlier on, when there is better chance to cure them

on the flipside -- avoiding unhealthy things, especially environmental health factors like carcinogens and microplastics, often requires a certain level of wealth.

The "wellness" industry is a way to scam rich people. You want to believe you can spend your money to opt out of environmental toxins by shopping at Erewhon. But you're still going to be exposed to all of this stuff unless you live in a hermetically sealed bubble and never leave. Or if you get rid of toxins in your area, an action which affects everyone.

The hard truth is that pollution and environmental toxins affect everyone present in that environment. Taxes and government regulation are going to do far more for the wealthy than individual changes in shopping habits.

> Or if you get rid of toxins in your area

Moving can often accomplish that depending on the selected location.

I have the opposite reaction.

Because of their stress levels and possible smoking/drinking/drugs? I don’t buy into “yeah they’re rich/famous but that’s a lot of stress” narrative.

In the case of a CEO of a major South Korean company, I could believe that stress could have contributed to his heart attack. But for specifically the actors/musicians category of the rich and famous, it seems like drugs tends to be a limiting factor on lifespan.

I suspect it's more of "the witch is dead/the rich is dead"

If you want to die you don't have to wait for it

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