Happy 5th Walkiversary

Walk with a Doc Newsletter

Good morning. There are two things I want to talk about today, and they’re both deep.

Before we get to that, El Paso and Dayton – we love you. All of us reading or writing this today are here for you. You are our family.

Enough

We just returned from a week of college visit (VA and NC). During our trip, I read Mandela’s tour de force autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom. Many of you are familiar, but when Mandela felt ANC’s passive resistance movement wasn’t accomplishing what South Africa needed, he started Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK).

MK became the armed wing of the ANC and guess what?

Things started progressing faster towards ‘one person, one vote’ and the end of the minority regime.

We’re of course never going to take up arms, but I’m getting a little restless.

How many people do you think die every day from a sedentary lifestyle?

13,698 people every day, from not having a simple, short walk, bike ride, etc. as part of their day.

Who is okay with that?

You’re not okay with that.

We’re not okay with that.

Now, we have to figure out WHO in the world is okay with that and how we turn this thing up.

In 2013, sedentary diseases were estimated to cost us about the $67.5 billion dollars a year, globally. Last year, by my math, a ballpark of $50 million was allocated to the CDC to fight sedentary lifestyles (by far, the lion’s share).

$50 million divided by $67.5 billion is 0.00074.

Congress is allocating 0.074% to fight the problem.

You can tell I was a real joy to be around last week.

I don’t know exactly how we are going to ratchet this up yet, but we are and it’s going to be good. Enough is enough.

As I shared, I don’t know for sure where we are all going, but I do know where we started – with you.

You, either leading, attending, or supporting WWAD. That’s where we started.

Today, I’d like to introduce one of our Freedom Fighters, Dr. Megan Mescher-Cox, inVentura County, CA, we met her last year in Indianapolis and she is ALL IN to fight for people’s lives, don’t let the smile fool you.

Megan is averaging about 40-50 walkers per walk and has several other doctors involved as well. Dr. Cox says, “Walk with a Doc days are, by far, my favorite day of the month.” They have participants of all ages and fitness levels, but the one thing they have in common is the big smiles on their faces while they walk together and learn about health.

Takes a superhero to share a ‘superpower’, have you seen this great article?

Thank you TMA and the great urologist, Manny Padron.

Baltimore

Here are six reasons why our thoughts are on this beautiful city the last two weeks

1) It’s beautiful and it’s filled with 600+ thousand people that care for their family, their friends, their neighbors and their community.

2) It is represented by an excellent human being, Congressman Elijah Cummings, that has fought with a passion for not only Baltimore but our country for decades.

3) It is the brand spanking new home of our mind-blowing COO Rachael Habash, therein establishing our much needed WWAD East HQ.

4) Home of this super cool library on my bucket list. Who puts a library on their ‘list’?

5) Home of the Ulman Foundation, led by an incredible family and started by a game-changer that has helped wwad in many ways.

6) This one is sad, no WWAD in Baltimore. Calling on all with connections – we need your help!