Journalists everywhere have provided plenty of food for thought on the passing of The King of Pop, Michael Jackson, but I, as a health professional, offer a different perspective here.

Just like any other fan, my heart sank, too, on hearing that MJ's time to do what he'd been so blessed to do had tragically ended. After all, with but a few bars of his music, I'm out on the dance floor; plus for me, his performance style will always symbolize artistry and talent from head to toe.

But though I was deeply saddened to learn of MJ's death, I was not the least bit stunned. Alas, Jackson was hardly our only star to have had life cut short. In fact, the messages I've taken away from the pop singer's death apply to every one of us and resonate all the way to Washington.

In a poem penned in 1979, my late mother likened life to a marathon race. On one level, over the years, I've taken that to mean that in order to stay on this earth, continuing to do what it is we love or were meant to do, we need to stay on track. Human minds and bodies can only take so much stress and abuse.

Over the long haul, brain and overall health — both functions of lifestyle, e.g., diet, exercise, sleep patterns, exposure to toxic substances, or other stress factors; everything we do or don't do, but should — become key factors in determining the direction careers and lives take.

Talent is one part of the puzzle, but talent alone is not enough. Even before the final autopsy results are released, that Michael Jackson's life ended at age 50 is yet another reminder that lifestyle choices make a world of difference. Of course, so pathetic in Jackson's case were the many poor choices the performer made because he was never satisfied with himself.

But in addition, that health care professionals may all along have been exploiting his weaknesses and facilitating his addictions — rather than seeing he received effective treatment — makes me question how many other Americans are similarly enslaved by habituating prescription drugs.

How many licensed medical professionals in the U.S. have been making fortunes by promoting and exploiting addictions to pharmaceuticals, and how many millions of dollars have Medicare, Medicaid, private health insurers, or private pay patients thus been shelling out to those professionals, let alone for the habituating substances themselves?

Besides the passing of a pop music icon and the message about lifestyle choices, therefore, I say Michael Jackson's death — Anna Nicole Smith's in February 2007, too, among others' — had special relevance in that it planted a red flag on a potentially mammoth iceberg at an opportune point in time.

While Washington ponders pouring billions of dollars into our uber-ill health care system — the medical profession meanwhile grappling to preserve as much of its power/prosperity as possible — a serious look at the prescription drug addiction problem in the U.S., and the professionals responsible for it, is thus definitely warranted, as is subsequent aggressive action to address it.

May Michael Jackson's soul rest in peace, and may his children face their challenging futures, carrying his love and blessed memory forever in their hearts.