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American Income Life Insurance Company Executive Offices P.O. Box 208 Waco, Texas 76703 Bernard Rapoport, Chairman of the Board Note: We are pleased to bring you this first issue of HEALTH ADVISOR, a public service message from the Bernard Rapoport Postgraduate Institute for Digestive Health, and the American Digestive Disease Society. This is the first of a series of reports which we hope will help you live healthier and happier lives. VOL. 1 JUNE itirn #1 ADVISOR How to Live Forever .. . How do you feel about living forever? Does the possibility seem ridiculous? Improbable? Frightening? Well, you should know two things: first, no one dies of old age because old age is not a disease. And second, the work that scientists are doing will eventually extend life well beyond present average age limits. Doctors say that our bodies are capable of living 130 years if we don’t mess them up. As we get older and just a little bit wiser, we begin to realize that we’re not immortal. It’s at about that time we begin to measure exactly what we mean by “living”. Life has its ups and downs. It helps to learn to measure what is really important, and what is not. It’s not an easy process. We worry about money. We worry about our children. We worry about the state of the world; about the future; about our personal relationships; our job. We want success. We want to be happy. But that little bit of wisdom we’ve acquired has taught us that we can do almost anything, get past most of our problems, if we’re healthy. When we realize that health is first, then we’ve reached an important level in our adult lives. Once we reach it, we can generally begin to decide if simply being alive is really “living”; whether we’re really happy at home and on the job; whether we’re using the best of ourselves, or faking. As a life insurance company we !have all sorts of tables, charts, statistics and percentages to help us measure and compare life expectancy. These charts help us serve you. But none of them, no set of numbers, can measure the quality of life. What do we mean by quality? Well, there seems to be little purpose in living a long life if each day seems a personal torture; if the weeks, months and years stretch ahead without purpose. And there is absolutely no way to avoid those feelings, if a person must live with a chronic illness everyday of his life. And since more than half of us more than 100 million Americans have some form of chronic illness, we think it’s important to talk not only about life expectancy, but about the quality of the life we lead. As an insurance company, we will continue to pay attention to charts, tables and statistics. That’s part of the way we operate and it helps you. But at American Income Life, we think there’s more to it. We care about the quality of your life. We think that our caring sets us apart; reminds us and you that a growing successful corporation is people working, living, feeling just the way you do. We believe the one vital element of your life you can control, to an extent well beyond your imagination, is your health. But it must be important to you. It must be worth your time and effort. If is it . . . we’ll help you. With the help of the Bernard Rapoport Institute for Digestive Health and the American Digestive Disease VISOR regularly. We want you to look forward to it; to take a few moments to “talk with us” about those areas of health which are important to you, which you can do something about. We’ll show you “what is” and “what should be” in your life. If you have questions, write us. We’ll answer and share your questions and thoughts with all those reading the Advisor. We’ll help you if we answer your unspoken questions and thoughts; if we get you to say “yes, of course, that’s common sense . . . ” We’ll help you if you think about what we’ve written after you’ve read it . . . and then share it with friends. Information strengthens all of us. It can help make some of us well. 14 JULY 4, 1980