More than 25 percent of Americans are obese. Obesity-related illnesses currently cost $147 billion per year, according to a new study by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which is hosting the first ever “Weight of the Nation” conference.
The report specifies being obese as having a body mass index of 30 or greater. A 5-foot-7 person with a BMI of 30 weighs 192 pounds.
Per capita medical spending during 2006 was 42% higher for obese people when compared with “regular” weight people. The per capita percentage increase in costs due to obesity during 2006 was approximately 36% for Medicare, 47% for Medicaid as well as 58% for private payers.
Prescription drugs for obesity-related illness answered for most of the rise in spending. For instance, Medicare spends almost $600 more per year on prescription medications on an obese patient than for a normal-weight patient.
President Barack Obama has stated he and his administration would like to control the climbing cost of health care in part by preventive medicine programs, for example those to help people lose weight or stop smoking. Medicare, the government run program for the elderly and disabled, spent $7 billion on obesity-related prescriptions drugs, like those to treat diabetes, high cholesterol and blood pressure, the report said.
The CDC says the U.S. needs to bring down the obesity rate to cut health care costs. It recommends that communities fight obesity by marketing healthier eating and physical activity.
One solution is to tax sugar drinks. If sugary drinks were taxed at $.01 per ounce, the U.S. Would make $100 billion to $200 billion over the next decade, Thomas Frieden, MD, MPH, told public health workers and antiobesity advocates at the CDC’s “Weight of the Nation” conference
Dr. Frieden said the average American takes in almost 250 more calories per day than a decade ago. Of that, approximately 120 calories are from soda pop and other sugar sweetened drinks, he said.
“Obesity, and with it diabetes, are the only major health problems that are getting worse in this country, and they are getting worse rapidly,” Frieden said. “The average American is now 23 pounds overweight.”
In case the health care reform provides the general public with peace of mind, the rising mental stress or illness caused by financial instability may bend the curve surprisingly,
in combination with kicking out the ‘keep eating habit’ to forget the deep-seated instability and apprehension, I guess.
‘Work or Break’ health system with no brake or safety system might be one of the biggest hidden causes of mental stress, obesity or overweight threatening the overall economy, I cautiously suppose.