I just finished reading The Science of Fear by Daniel Gardner.  It gives a good explanation of why we fear some things more than we should and that causes us to change our habits which puts us in more danger.  His opening example is that following September 11 2001 many people stopped flying and drove cars instead, fearing another air disaster.  We have a gut feeling that flying is unsafe, but car travel is ok.  This gut feeling is wrong, air travel is safer.  In the year from September 11, 2001 to September 11, 2012 there were 1595 more automobile related deaths than in the 5 years before and the 5 years after.  By not flying more people endangered themselves.  We see this with parents who won’t allow their children in a house that has guns in it but they have no problem sending them to a house with a pool.  According to the Center for Disease Control drowning is the second leading cause of death to a child by accidental injury, and guns are so far down the list they are lumped into the ‘other’ category.  Far and away the leading cause is motor vehicle accidents.  We see the same with healthcare, 3 different studies from leading institutions have shown that medical mistakes kill around 100,000 people a year, but often people are afraid of chiropractors and acupuncturists.  If either of those professions had anything close to that record they would be gone by now.
Why do we fear so many things more than we should?  The author goes into a number of reasons.  News constantly gives us examples that remind us to be scared.  If there is not killer in your neighborhood or city, they run a story about the one in another state, if none is there, they can find one in another country.  If we know of an example of something happening then our gut tells us it must be a clear and present danger.  That was true when people lived and died within 5 miles of their birth, and news traveled very slowly, but that is not the case today.  Our gut also uses the ‘Good/Bad’ rule.  If something is good, like a swimming pool, we tend to downgrade our impression of the related danger.  If it is ‘bad’ (nuclear power) then we tend to over estimate the danger of whatever it is.
The bottom line of the book is that we are living in the safest time in history, and due to the mass of information around us we are in fear on a regular basis.  This can have a significant Bad effect on our health.  Fear causes stress hormone changes that can alter brain chemistry, decrease fertility, wipeout immune system function, and lower memory, among other things.  A simple Stress Response Evaluation can help determine if you are being affected or not.  If so life style changes may be in order.  If you are interested in having a Stress Response Evaluation find a local chiropractor with a neuroinfiniti.-