With the overall cost of health care in the U.S. nearing 2.5 trillion dollars per year, the debate in Washington D. C. has focused primarily on how to pay the bill. While the debate has gotten highly contentious, I think we can all agree on one simple and obvious truth: there is NO good way to pay a 2.5 trillion dollar health care bill.
The results of a research study published in the Aug. 2009 edition of the Archive of Internal medicine may help shed light on our dilemma. In the study involving over 23,000 participants aged 35-65, scientists measured the impact of lifestyle factors on the development of specific chronic diseases: type 2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke and cancer. The four lifestyle factors the researchers considered were 1) exercising 3.5 hours per week (or 30 min. per day) 2) adhering to a healthy diet high in fruits, vegetables and whole-grains and low in meat consumption 3) not smoking and 4)maintaining a body mass index lower than 30.
The results of the study showed that as the number of healthy lifestyle factors increased, the participant’s chances of developing any of the chronic diseases decreased. Adopting all four lifestyle factors resulted in a 78% lower chance of developing one of these chronic diseases as compared to adopting none of them. Let me repeat that. Adopting 4 simple lifestyle factors dramatically reduces your chances of developing type-2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke and cancer. These are the most prevalent chronic diseases in the United States. Additionally, over 75% of the health care budget is spent treating chronic disease.
Thus we have a health care budget in which over $1.7 trillion goes to treat chronic diseases, nearly 80% of which are preventable. That comes to approximately $1.3 trillion that is essentially voluntary. With numbers like this, how is it we haven’t committed ourselves to a nationwide cooperative effort of individuals, community groups, government organizations and health care providers to radically accelerate the adoption of these lifestyle factors that are free to the “consumer”? Such an effort could have a massive economic effect that would completely change the parameters of the current health care debate.
It seems we would rather argue, complain and pay through the nose than make simple lifestyle changes for ourselves and encourage others to make them.