Why Is The Life Expectancy Of Canadians 3 Years Longer Than The U.S

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Why is the life expectancy of Canadians 3 years longer than the U.S.?

"Women in Canada live an average of 83 years, compared to 80 in theU.S.; men live more than 78 years on average compared to 75 in the United States."

Personally I am doubtful this is just because they have better health care.

Comparing the two countries is intriguing to me as generally speaking the nutritional and health habits of both countries are quite similar.

I was digging around and two things stand out to me.:

1. Average caloric intake is around the same between the two countries (3500 CA, 3700 US). While saturated fat consumption is about the same between countries (10% of calories CA, and 11% USA) Canadians consume less PUFA; I reached this conclusion by finding that 50% of vegetable oil in Canada consumed is canola oil (20% soy oil), where as in the US around 57% of the oil consumed is soy oil (13% canola oil). Palm, corn, olive etc etc consumption all are around the same between the two countries. Soy is around 60% PUFA, where as canola is around 30% PUFA. Taking these numbers alone, we see that Canada on average is taking in 14.4 grams of PUFA daily, where as US is taking in an average of 17.2 grams PUFA daily. ***

2. Since 1994 Canada does not allow potassium bromate in their flour. In the 1950s the US stopped using potassium iodate as a dough conditioner as bakers switched over to using potassium bromate. Bromide interferes with iodine retention / is an endocrine disruptor.


*** It is also interesting to see that Japan and Hong Kong top vegetable oil consumed is canola, and they are at the top of the list for life expectancy (~84 years). Where as China as a whole is dominated by soy oil consumption, and their life expectancy is lower by nearly 8 years.

What do you all think? I'm interested to hear what else you think might be making Canadians live a bit longer.

sources:
List of countries by food energy intake - Wikipedia
https://www.heartandstroke.ca/-/med...osition-statement/saturatedfat-eng-final.ashx
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhanes/databriefs/calories.pdf
The other “big oil” - Food In Canada
USDA ERS - Oil Crops Yearbook
https://apps.fas.usda.gov/GainFiles/199910/25536052.pdf
 
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Captain_Coconut
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Okay, I'm branching this out from Canada now. Looking at Singapore, they get over 30% of their calories from fat! What's interesting is that they have an average intake of around 17 grams of PUFA daily just like the US. This is more extreme though because they get an average of 2600 calories a day (US is around 3700). But what is quite amazing to me here is that Singapore has one of the highest life expectancies (around 83 years on average). Well guess what, they consume a higher ratio of MUFA and SFA to PUFA. Much higher than here in the US and likely much higher than most countries. This data corroborates very well with what RP has to say about saturated fat protecting from PUFA consumption. It appears their primary cooking oil is palm and coconut. I could not find historical figures, but I would also suppose that they are relatively new to consuming PUFA in such large amounts

"The P: M: S ratio for adult Singapore residents was 0.50: 1.00: 1.00, indicating that MUFA and SFA were the two major types of fatty acid consumed by adult Singapore residents and the respective energy contribution were 5.8%, 11.6% and 11.8%."

The P:M:S for the average US diet in terms of energy contribution would be around: 4.1%, 7.3%, 6.3%

We can see here that the Singapore ratio of S:P of 2 is much higher than the US - S:P ratio of 1.5
Ratio of M+S:P for Singapore is 4.3, vs US - M+S:P ratio of 3.3

Wow, the Men in Singapore also average around 5 alcoholic beverages a day.

sources:
https://www.hpb.gov.sg/docs/default-source/pdf/nns-2010-report.pdf?sfvrsn=18e3f172_2
List of countries by life expectancy - Wikipedia
 
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OP
Captain_Coconut
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I got tired of trying to pull up so many reports for specific country data so I'm just going to eye-ball this from a map taken from this study, which unfortunately does not provide the raw data... and also says nothing about MUFA consumption...
Global, regional, and national consumption levels of dietary fats and oils in 1990 and 2010: a systematic analysis including 266 country-specific nutrition surveys

So going down the line of countries with best life expectancy we have Japan, Switzerland, Singapore, Australia, Spain etc..... I am skipping countries that are too small and blurred out on the map to identify the color. For perspective: the top 10 on the following list have an average life expectancy of 83 - the bottom 10 an expectancy of 77. Top 10 avg sfa::m6 ratio: 2.4 ; Bottom 10 avg sfa::m6 ratio: 1.7

SFA to Omega 6 ratios:

Japan: 1.9
Switzerland: 2.6
Singapore: 2.0
Australia: 2.4
Spain: 1.9 (large consumer of olive oil...)
Iceland: 4.8
Italy: 1.2 (large consumer of olive oil...)
Sweden: 2.9
France: 2.0
South Korea: 2.3
Canada: 2.8
Netherlands: 2.3
Norway: 3.8
Malta: 3.3
New Zealand: 2.4
Austria: 2.7
Ireland: 2.2
United Kingdom: 2.4
Belgium: 2.7
Finland: 3.7
Portugal: 1.4 (large consumer of olive oil...)
Germany: 3.3
Greece: 1.9 (large consumer of olive oil...)
Slovenia: 1.5
Denmark: 4.2
Chile: 1.7
Costa Rica: 1.4
United States: 1.5
Cuba: 1.2
Czech Republic: 1.6
Croatia: 1.6
Albania: 1.4
Panama: 1.0
Estonia: 2.2
Poland: 2.6
Bosnia and Herzegovina: 1.6
United Arab Emirates: 1.7
Uruguay: 1.7
Mexico: 1.7
 

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yerrag

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I think this has a lot to do with independence. The U.S. being a hegemon has great influence in dictating the thoughts of countries that haven't developed a strong tradition, especially in areas of medicine. The Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans have a deep tradition in herbs, and so do many countries in Western Europe. The Old World also have deeply-ingrained traditions and philosophies that allow a large section of the population to question medical propaganda that have an interest other than good health outcomes in mind. Nations that are relatively new, from the periphery and from the New World, do not have such traditions that can withstand the dominant mercantilist push of corporate powers that are part of the the financial-military-medical industrial complex.

Canada is a mosaic rather than a melting pot. Within Canada, there are separate cultures that do not have to surrender their individuality to a dominant culture of thought.
 

Terma

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Cause we still haven't caught up yet. Don't worry all your companies already own us and the public front Health Canada is a tool at your disposal.

The best time to come here is when you develop a rare condition. Then you can exploit it to feed your masochism fetish, and become legally forced to hand over thousands a year to other people in three times better health than you are while you rot in a physiological and psychological hell and we prevent you access to any medical resource remotely leading-edge enough to help. OR, fuel your 90s 'memorabilia' fetish. We'll cater to all! Here in Canada we understand what unites all peoples and cultures from around the globe: everyone has a fetish. Tolerance is love. Or is love tolerance. Whatever, man. What's ours? Being compared against countries with 10 times the populations. Thanks for that, baby [cue sexy music]
 
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BingDing

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I think this has a lot to do with independence. The U.S. being a hegemon has great influence in dictating the thoughts of countries that haven't developed a strong tradition, especially in areas of medicine. The Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans have a deep tradition in herbs, and so do many countries in Western Europe. The Old World also have deeply-ingrained traditions and philosophies that allow a large section of the population to question medical propaganda that have an interest other than good health outcomes in mind. Nations that are relatively new, from the periphery and from the New World, do not have such traditions that can withstand the dominant mercantilist push of corporate powers that are part of the the financial-military-medical industrial complex.

Canada is a mosaic rather than a melting pot. Within Canada, there are separate cultures that do not have to surrender their individuality to a dominant culture of thought.

Good insight!
 

x-ray peat

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I would guess a lot of the difference can be explained by the different demographic makeup of each country. The US has a higher proportion of African Americans who tend to have a lower life expectancy than the average while Canada has a higher proportion of Asians which tend to have a higher life expectancy than the average.

Kind of reminds me of the general claim that men make much more than women. If you take apart the general statistic and control for confounding variables the difference isnt nearly as great.
 
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Captain_Coconut
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I would guess a lot of the difference can be explained by the different demographic makeup of each country. The US has a higher proportion of African Americans who tend to have a lower life expectancy than the average while Canada has a higher proportion of Asians which tend to have a higher life expectancy than the average.

Kind of reminds me of the general claim that men make much more than women. If you take apart the general statistic and control for confounding variables the difference isnt nearly as great.

Yeah that is likely a possibility. I'd be interested in seeing the different pufa/mufa/sfa intake per race in the US.
 

yerrag

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I would guess a lot of the difference can be explained by the different demographic makeup of each country. The US has a higher proportion of African Americans who tend to have a lower life expectancy than the average while Canada has a higher proportion of Asians which tend to have a higher life expectancy than the average.

Kind of reminds me of the general claim that men make much more than women. If you take apart the general statistic and control for confounding variables the difference isnt nearly as great.

Good point. It would be interesting, though, to check whether the effect is a matter of wealth, or race, or the general attitudes and norms w/r to health and health care in the country. Every country has its share of poor. And many Asians emigrating to the US have more health issues compared to their cousins in the home country. I don't know about Africans, as for the most part the African Americans in the US are not new immigrants, but I would not be surprised if recent African American immigrants are generally healthier than the African Americans that are xth generation. And their cousins may be healthier in the native country, although that can be confounded by the state of wealth and peace in their native country.
 

tara

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I'm no expert on either Canada or US. ....

I expect there are other dietary differences than just fat composition.

Other environmental factors might differ - pollution, time outdoors etc?

Wouldnt't surprise me if there are some cultural influences as well as environmental.
More egalitarian societies generally make for better health for the overall population (and lower crime, etc).

Less life stress of various kinds?
From where I am, there seem to be some fairly stressful factors to contend with for many in the US. Higher rates of shootings, bankruptcies related to health events, evictions, homelessness, wildfires, some fairly extreme social disharmony in places etc... Not that there isn't any in Canada, it just doesn't seem, from distance and relative ignorance, to be quite so widespread and extreme. Does that seem realistic?
 
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Captain_Coconut
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Yes, Canada seems less stressed the times I have visited. But maybe that is simply because they consume more SFA to PUFA? ;)

Attached a scatter plot of the data I posted earlier for the top 39 countries in terms of life expectancy. I added a 1 to the ratio of the 4 olive oil countries, because I think MUFA protects from PUFA in a similar way that SFA does. Obviously this is nowhere near as useful as seeing how long someone actually lived, and what their average meal was like, but it is at least somewhat interesting to look at.

Untitled.jpg
 
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x-ray peat

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Yes, Canada seems less stressed the times I have visited. But maybe that is simply because they consume more SFA to PUFA? ;)

Attached a scatter plot of the data I posted earlier for the top 39 countries in terms of life expectancy. I added a 1 to the ratio of the 4 olive oil countries, because I think MUFA protects from PUFA in a similar way that SFA does. Obviously this is nowhere near as useful as seeing how long someone actually lived, and what there average meal was like, but it is at least somewhat interesting to look at.

View attachment 9305
nice work. Is your graph title backwards? I think your data is SFA:PUFA. Otherwise we are on the wrong website.
 
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Captain_Coconut
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nice work. Is your graph title backwards? I think your data is SFA:PUFA. Otherwise we are on the wrong website.
oops, thanks, will correct
 

yerrag

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I expect there are other dietary differences than just fat composition.

Other environmental factors might differ - pollution, time outdoors etc?
There are others, especially differences on attitudes towards -

- macronutrient ratios: do the general populace eat a large steak and a small potato, or slivers of meat with a large portion of rice; do they eat plenty of fruits and vegetables that provide the base and alkalinity to balance out the pH in the body? The longevity of the internal organs, and life itself, is affected.

- quality of life: is life structured so much in a way that everything has to be convenient and efficient? The tradeoff is having to eat out, or eat processed foods, as a preference over the inefficiency of home cooked meals, where the possibility of meeting life-prolonging nutritional needs is more attainable. The time spent on heavy traffic, the high cost of health insurance from a misguided healthcare system, the onerous and litigious legal system - all these impose a burden that eats away at our free time that can be used to develop. The scarcity of options it presents make us captive to conventional wisdom, which is often wrong, and leads us to a lifestyle dictated by the programming of media manipulated by corporate interests. Corporate interests are almost always against individual growth, and health, and peace, as defects they create and the void they fill is what constitutes their market. The lack of quality of life inevitably takes its toll on our general health, and our longevity. Longevity in itself is not worth it if the life lived isn't a healthy and happy life. Proof is in the epidemic of school shootings, of young people wishing to die, not only to die, but to make a statement of how life sucks. Yet media and politics miss the point entirely, and blame it on guns, and guns can't talk.
 

DaveFoster

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There are others, especially differences on attitudes towards -

- macronutrient ratios: do the general populace eat a large steak and a small potato, or slivers of meat with a large portion of rice; do they eat plenty of fruits and vegetables that provide the base and alkalinity to balance out the pH in the body? The longevity of the internal organs, and life itself, is affected.

- quality of life: is life structured so much in a way that everything has to be convenient and efficient? The tradeoff is having to eat out, or eat processed foods, as a preference over the inefficiency of home cooked meals, where the possibility of meeting life-prolonging nutritional needs is more attainable. The time spent on heavy traffic, the high cost of health insurance from a misguided healthcare system, the onerous and litigious legal system - all these impose a burden that eats away at our free time that can be used to develop. The scarcity of options it presents make us captive to conventional wisdom, which is often wrong, and leads us to a lifestyle dictated by the programming of media manipulated by corporate interests. Corporate interests are almost always against individual growth, and health, and peace, as defects they create and the void they fill is what constitutes their market. The lack of quality of life inevitably takes its toll on our general health, and our longevity. Longevity in itself is not worth it if the life lived isn't a healthy and happy life. Proof is in the epidemic of school shootings, of young people wishing to die, not only to die, but to make a statement of how life sucks. Yet media and politics miss the point entirely, and blame it on guns, and guns can't talk.
Happy people do live longer, though. They also live social lives.
 

burtlancast

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In before Tara

As of May 2000, 42 of the 50 largest U.S. cities had water fluoridation.[136] In 2010, 66% of all U.S. residents and 74% of U.S. residents with access to community water systems receive fluoridated water.[137] In 2010, a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study determined that "40.7% of adolescents aged 12–15 had dental fluorosis [in 1999–2004]

Overall, about 45% of the Canadian population had access to fluoridated water supplies in 2007.[120]

( Occam's razor )
 
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tara

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In before Tara & Occam's razor
Lol. :)
Flouride could be in there too, not likely to be helpful. I'm still picking this as likely key, though:
More egalitarian societies generally make for better health for the overall population (and lower crime, etc).
 

bradley

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I'm originally from Canada. I think it's mainly that there's less poverty in Canada, better social safety nets, lower income disparity, and higher minimum wage. It doesn't require a dramatic leap in logic to realize these factors lead to longer life expectency:
New study shows rich, poor have huge mortality gap in U.S.

Secondarily, no one is denied medical care since everyone is insured.
 
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rei

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The more you are exposed to the healthcare system the worse your overall health gets. Only beneficial exposure you can have is to put you back into one piece after trauma. See, problems of nutrition and lifestyle should be corrected by nutrition and lifestyle. Not masked by taking a drug.

In canada the healtcare system does as little as possible because it is taxpayer funded. In USA it does as much as possible because that's how doctors make money.
 

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