Comment by gggibi08 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by gggibi08 | Hacker News Reader

This study is backward looking; it hasn't taken account of China's current set of factors that could skew the lifespan down tremendously for average Chinese citizens. Factors such as

1.) Air pollution. In your typical big cities, e.g Beijing, it average AQI 100-150 for the past 10+ years https://young-0.com/airquality/. In other lower tiered cities, it average between 50-100. Just to compare, WHO recommend only AQI of 25 in 24 hour span to be ok for your health. And even though recently Beijing's AQI has gone down, what the government has done is they pushed the coal-burning factories into the countryside, and moving the pollutions there.

2.) Water pollution. Cancer causing ingredients have been found in several water sources. for example: "Shanghai water supply hit by 100-tonne wave of garbage " - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/23/shanghai-water... https://qz.com/113751/only-3-of-shanghais-river-and-lake-wat...

3.) Smoking/smokers everywhere. "Smoking Will Kill 200 Million In China This Century" https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/smoking-will-kill-200-m...

Not fitting your narrative doesn't mean it is backward. The healthcare infrastructure the government has invested and fast progression of technology to catch up with rest of the world after opening up help greatly. My parents now have something called 'Serious Illness Insurance' that comes only in recent years, which would cover cost for illness like cancer or big surgeries to up to 90% by the government, which I think is a good example where the progress has been made. Also Chinese healthcare system is still largely stated owned, it is bad news for the doctors, but it makes the cost to access necessary treatment relatively low, much more so than the US.

Problem remains, but generally, comparing what China used to have in 90s, it is like a heaven and earth difference.

All valid points. The good news is that China has big ideas for dealing with these, and will actually implement them.

I have no love for the CCP. I think they are an oppressive regime that unduly subjects their people to censorship and control. But I do respect that they invest in infrastructure and solving big problems for their people.

The US seems to have given up. It seems to think that the problems we face are unsolvable by cooperation and have resigned us to crumbling roads, poor health outcomes and failing schools so corporations can flourish.

The CPC has always had big plans for solving air pollution and smoking problems, ever since I started living there in 2007. Each campaign subsequently failed, so they don’t have a great track record on actually “getting things done.” Maybe it’s different this time, but a healthy dose of skepticism is definitely warranted.

Once my wife was pregnant, we had to leave Beijing, there was no way the air pollution problem would have been solved in time, even if the air got twice as clean it would still be way too much. Say what you want about the USA, but being able to open my windows everyday is incredibly liberating.

The Economist says the opposite: https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2018/01/25/...

Are you saying that this article makes the claim that the government has successfully dealt with the problem or just that the current campaign seems to be effective?

Someone once told me:

China is like the kid that has to be home by 8pm because his parents want to make sure he gets his homework done after dinner.

The US is like the kid whose parents hired a nanny to make dinner for them and help the kid with his homework if he asks.

Pollution is indeed a big problem. I think it is closely related to both economy and national psychology. The economy has to develop to a point that the government decides that it is preferable to slow down economy and allocate more resources to deal with pollution. One example is the recent ban of importing garbages. It will take years to clean the pollution.

Smoking/smokers problem has been improving. (Anecdotal evidence) Most men in my hometown were smokers when I grew up. So were my friends/classmates when they turned 20s. It was a norm in social meetings. The last few years when I visited them, most quit smoking. Based on my nephews, there are much less smokers in the young generation.

How is it backward looking?

Do you think the data is wrong? Or interpreted wrong? You’ve presented some news articles about issues in China but I don’t know how these affects overall life expectancy in combination with all the other factors. Do you?

They seem to think they’ve taken account of likely future trends and ongoing health issues because they’ve said:

> Chinese newborns can look forward to 68.7 years of healthy life ahead of them

Do you think they’re mistaken somehow?

> How is it backward looking?

I don't have an opinion about China, but just in general, I'm sure they don't have data from the future :-) I would say it is okay to say that about such predictions. There are others that don't rely as much on past data, but especially this kind of prediction surely is entirely based on numbers from the past, or do we have a model that reliably predicts those outcomes from at least present data (i.e. less data from people, but that it uses data about the circumstances, like amount & quality of sanitation and food)? If the model is purely based on human population statistics it's 100% past.

> I don't have an opinion about China, but just in general, I'm sure they don't have data from the future :-)

Well then all studies are ‘backward looking’ then and it’s a stupid criticism, and why mention it since it’s obvious and there’s no other way they could have done it.

I think what you just wrote falls back on you. The parent just mentioned it, nothing special, AND it made sense as part of his argument. It was you who made a big deal of it.

You wrote

> How is it backward looking?

Which is clearly wrong! You even just admitted it.

Please don't try to make it look like it's the parent commenters fault now.

All you listed are likely urban problems. China has like 1B country population.

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