"Healthy Parents have Healthy Children."
Posted on 08/11/2007 11:03:25 PM PDT by neverdem
We do not have a health care crisis in this country - we have a health crisis with a health care system incapable of dealing with it.
Consider the fact that 75% of the $2 trillion we spend on health care goes toward treating the symptoms of chronic disease, and not toward preventing disease in the first place. Imagine if we were to reverse that model by focusing on prevention, wellness, and early testing, all of which are undervalued and poorly supported today. We would save countless lives, pain and suffering by the victims of chronic conditions, and billions of dollars. Realizing this potential will not be easy. It will require a fundamental transformation of a health care system focused on acute care into one focused upon maximizing individual health as our first priority.
Our vision should be to have the healthiest people, not just the best health care, in the world.. With prevention and wellness as the cornerstone of our health policy, we can be number one in both.
For example, according to the World Health Organization, by not smoking, eating healthier diets, and exercising, we could prevent 40% of cancers, 80% of Type-2 diabetes, and 80% of heart disease and save hundreds of billions of dollars every year just from these prevention methods alone. But much more than money is at stake here. If we continue down our current path of ignoring the consequences of unhealthy lifestyles including poor diet and lack of exercise, one-third of our children will develop diabetes, a debilitating and deadly condition. For the first time in our history, a generation of...
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Our current employer-based system, which was originally adopted as a way around wage and price controls during World War II, almost totally removes the consumer from normal free market practices.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
Can't we just ban all unhealthy foods and activities?
Wellness (and prevention) was supposed to the cornerstone of the original HMO programs. Trouble was no one would reimburse physicians for such procedures, even though they gave it great lip service. I proposed a wellness clinic back in 1987, following the rhetoric of the HMO’s. The very same HMO’s said there’s no money (they controlled the money) “available” for this. That was 20 years ago, Newt.
or hmm give a tax credit for lowering BMI?
On a serious note, I could go for that suggestion.
Michael Moore can thereby be taxed to oblivion.
BMI bites...use an index of % body fat/BP/cholesterol.
yeah it’s not a pure “libertarian” idea but it’s just the sort of incentive idea that was behind the welfare reform in Contract with America. People will be paid to lose weight, obesity will go down and we’ll see fewer health problems.
much easier to measure one variable and that would be either weight or body fat. Lose the weight and BP/chol will follow suit.
"Healthy Parents have Healthy Children."
We could let in real sugar instead of stopping it at the borders, and putting in corn syrup in its place. As there are very serious questions about what corn syrup does to our bodies hormone wise.
But then a couple very rich families benefiting from that wouldn’t make quite as much money next year.
In fact we have something like a quarter of the population on their way to being morbidly obese, and the associated heart-joint-diabetic problems that go along with it.
And we have a pharma industry who’s sole goal is to convince (with the aid of tv commercials) every living human that something is critically wrong with them. Their legs twitch at night, so get a prescription. They sometimes have heartburn, so get a prescription.
You need oxygen, so get a prescription.
Everyone someday dies. Unless death is from an accident or something else that occurs suddenly, people generally get ‘sick’ before they die. Sometimes that illness is brief before death (e.g. a fast-growing cancer), and sometimes it’s protracted. In either case, unless one chooses to let nature take its course and not intervene medically, there will be a time when most of us are consumers of health care. Preventative medicine, unless it results in illness-free immortality will not prevent us from eventually being health care consumers. People generally spend the most money they ever will on health care in the final years, or even months of their lives.
That said, it is true that if we reduce obesity we will have less diabetes, and therefore less expenditure for chronic blood glucose control and for treatment of diabetic complications. This is a worthy goal, as are the other interventions mentioned in the op-ed. It’s not a new concept, however. When I was a child (more decades ago than I like to think about) there were national programs for promoting physical fitness. There were national efforts to educate in schools about the four food groups and a healthy diet. These programs still exist. They can only go so far. Ultimately individuals have to make their own choices. In my experience many people do a better job taking care of their cars than they do their bodies.
It is true that govt policies have led to the replacement of sugar with corn syrup. If corn syrup was the cause of all our problems then the libertarian has an easy answer. End the corn syrup bias (subsidies and foreign sugar tariffs) and we’ll go back to more sugar.
However, I really doubt sugar is that much better than corn syrup. In the end, a calorie is a calorie and you’ll still gain weight with sugar.
My policy idea is better because it doesn’t ignore the problem but it also doesn’t punish people who choose high calorie food. It rewards people for real results. Health care costs will go down and we won’t have all these calls for govt health care.
“There’s no way to rule innocent men.
The only power government has is the power to crack down on criminals.
When there aren’t enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws.”
AYN RAND
You are so right. I watched my FIL and MIL get old and die and they used a lot of healthcare, thus medicare money in their last years. FIL (starting in his 90th year...up until then he had very few health problems) had cancer, but recovered. Then he fell, broke his hip, got MRSA and lingered for months, the cost was outrageous for the antibiotics to treat his MRSA, but you can't not treat. He lived a long time, considering his condition, in a specialty hospital that had a high level of care and charged big $$$.
I sure have used my share of our health care benefits over the years...we have group insurance through my husband's company. But could I have prevented my illness (MS)...no. All other aspects of my health are fine. People do not have control over many chronic illnesses and the meds to treat many of those illnesses are very expensive.
Then again what else would one expect from Head Hall Monitor Gingrich and Head Camp Councilor (and former fatty, former smoker) Huckabee?
These assclowns are FDR socialists, not conservative icons.
I imagine Huckabee will be on board there after the voters reject him.
An Intelligent Health System will be the greatest single 21st century source of high paying jobs and foreign exchange earnings as people across the world discover they want the quality of life, the level of health, and the effectiveness of health care which the American Intelligent Health System will make possible.
“...by not smoking, eating healthier diets, and exercising, “
What is the point?
No cigars?
Someone’s definition of ‘healthier’?
Exercise?
I take it you didn't read the 2nd half of the article and stopped at the point about not smoking..
One thing about the health problem is I think we have to attack it on many fronts. Supply side, demand side, incentives, etc.. I think your bmi idea would be hard to implement(for example for all these I think we need more doctors or Nurse Physicians and co, so we can spend real time with each person)... but I think you are onto something with working on the `carrot` ;) side of the equation, instead of the stick we usually use. Like taxes on cigarettes.
One possiblity is food stamps. A great number of children their families buy groceries on food stamps. Imagine with those you could only buy non-sugar cereal, milk, carrots, apples, `healthy fats`, lettuce etc..
We've met before, Black B----, and your level of altruism and caring has never failed to impress me.
That's the kind of thinking that has gotten our society into this mess.
Fats have more calories than carbs but the body processes the two differently. Carbs are processed rapidly and lead to spikes in blood sugar, which causes weight gain in most people.
Eliminating healthy fats which our ancestors ate in abundance and replacing them with modified fats, unhealthy fats, or carbs has caused most of the health challenges in our society.
That's why many primitive societies (such as found in parts of Africa) are healthier than our modern progressive ones, simply because they are still eating the diet that their ancestors for thousands of years have been eating. Natural selection automatically culls out members of the population that can't survive, and sadly, that is what we are seeing today: lots of natural selection for people who can't survive on the western diet of fast food, low-fat and high-carb junk food, low-nutrition food, unhealthy fats, and no exercise. Those people are not destined to poor health because of their genetics, they are just eating the wrong diet.
Europeans are generally healthier than Americans because they eat a more traditional diet for their society (anyone who has been to France or Germany will recognize this), not a diet founded on the USDA Food Pyramid, heavily weighted toward grains and starches.
There's lots of research on the subject here: Weston A. Price Foundation
“Any politician that intends to tell me what to eat and drink can go take a running jump at a rolling donut.
Then again what else would one expect from Head Hall Monitor Gingrich and Head Camp Councilor (and former fatty, former smoker) Huckabee?”
Nanny-staters of the worst sort, virtually identical to the Leftists. When will someone ever suggest to actually REDUCE the size and influence of gov’t in our lvies?
You are so right. One thing never really discussed in political discussions of health care reform is the affect socialized medicine (or whatever Hillary wants to call it) on the development of new treatments for MS and similar diseases. There are a lot of new things in the pipeline for MS, and a new associated gene was recently identified. All of that is money WELL spent, but it is expensive to do the research and drug development. When federal dollars start getting sucked into free wellness checkups for everyone, and for whatever national lifestyle/health programs that the politicians du jour dream up, what happens to discretionary spending on research? I guarantee that as federal budgets tighten, NIH research funding will diminish.
Also, although I’m not defending all actions by drug companies, if the government makes it unprofitable for them to do R&D for drugs that they can’t market to large groups of people, that R&D will dry up.
I hope your MS is quiescent and stays that way your entire life. I know how expensive MS drugs are, and I’m really happy to hear you have good group insurance. My personal belief is that people with diseases that they have no personal control over, like MS, deserve assistance with health care before those who through lifestyle choices contributed to their own conditions. I’m not being judgmental of them, but having MS and similar diseases is something that you have no control over, like losing your house to a tornado. I’m really sorry you’ve had to deal with this.
My MS is quite stable, I have some disability, but I’m mobile, and that’s a real blessing.
As to the meds, you’re right. They are expensive. I take an interferon and have for years. It’s not a cure, of course, but is supposed to lower exacerbations and extent of progression of the disease.
But there are new meds (Tysabri, for instance) where folks are giving really good reports about improvement they’re seeing on the med. While the interferons are expensive (about $1800 per month) Tysabri, is only a once a month infusion, but by the time you pay for the drug and the infusion center it can cost at least twice and sometimes three times what an interferon costs. But they are using it for people who have failed on the interferon or copaxone treatments, so it’s not that it’s a treatment of first choice.
Since MS is a disease that often affects young people, even with group insurance, there is a point at which folks would reach their maximum...if they were to get Tysabri infusions to keep their disease at bay. Of course, hopefully, they’ll be new drugs in the pipeline, maybe something cheaper (I can dream, LOL)...and people faced with maxing out their insurance by just getting treatments to keep their disease in check won’t be a reality.
Sorry to be a one trick pony. I happen to think we have a major health care crisis looming as the article suggests.
Wise up!
I wouldn’t go into micromanaging food even if we’re talking about a govt program like food stamps for several reasons.
First of all it could lead to the govt micromanaging food for everyone.
Also, there are so many diets, so much conflicting research on nutrition. What works for a high carb diet won’t won’t for someone on a low carb diet or assuming high calorie is bad when someone who tries to lose weight by exercising a lot.
Natural selection automatically culls out members of the population that can’t survive, and sadly, that is what we are seeing today
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no we do not. Natural selection is only going to weed out those that can’t survive long enough to reproduce. The diseases that obesity causes occur way after people stop having children.
People on a western diet are certainly capable of having lots of kids and they live much longer (and lower youth mortality rates) than those who live in primitive societies. probably for other reasons besides diet. But those people do choose to have more kids than most of those in the west.
Hopefully your right, but I am planning for the worst. Sort of like the Y2K nuts...
We're probably well on our way to a combination of both banning things and denying coverage.
much easier to measure one variable and that would be either weight or body fat. Lose the weight and BP/chol will follow suit.
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I saw a scale for home use for sale in Target with claims on the box that it would “calculate” body fat percentage and water weight percentage! I was suspicious so I started reading further and as far as I could tell you input your age and height and when you weigh yourself it will put up numbers for fat percentage and water percentage. This is pure bullfeathers, a classic case of garbage in, garbage out. No matter, there will be plenty of people who will fall for this.
the reason why I originally said bmi is that it is so much easier to measure than body fat%. but you still have to get yourself weighed by a doctor if you expect a tax credit.
So much better than taxing and banning things and my approach actually gets people to exercise. Also, my approach won’t give credit if you yo-yo because you need to prove you lost weight and kept it off for a minimum amount of time.
I am all for losing weight, it is just that the BMI is not nearly as meaningful as doctors would have you believe. Two men can be the same height and weight and have the same BMI but entirely different bodies. One may look wonderfully fit while the other looks like a blob. And the idea of a scale that calculates body fat percentage with just 3 inputs, age, height and weight is patently absurd.
We desperately need to find some way to motivate people, especially children, to get up off the couch and do something the way that people used to do. And we desperately need to get back on the track to eating a proper diet but how to convince people to do this is beyond me.
BMI bites...use an index of % body fat/BP/cholesterol.
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The problem with that is the doctors keep lowering the targets. What used to be considered good is now considered dangerous. Genuinely high blood pressure is serious business but cholesterol is not the danger that it is made out to be anyway, the medicines prescribed for it are more dangerous than the cholesterol will ever be. I swear the goal of medicine currently seems to be to have every person in the country on some form of chronic medication which they will be expected to take for the rest of their lives.
wouldn’t you agree that after a certain point (bmi>30) that it is a pretty good indication of obesity?
Indeed, the tax credit could be targeted so we get the most change and reward for the over 30 bmi population. Not for the “I have 5 pounds to lose for the beach” crowd.
If you tell people to focus on bmi, they can easily keep track of their progress at home with a scale and that would be a good motivator. If you focus on body fat %, most people won’t have any indication of progress for a long time.
wouldn’t you agree that after a certain point (bmi>30) that it is a pretty good indication of obesity?
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Only if you define obesity strictly in terms of weight without regard to percentage of body fat or muscle. According to BMI I am obese but a huge percentage of my weight is in my shoulders, chest and arms, I have a large bone structure, a large head, a thick muscular neck etc. I wear a size 52 coat and size 38 waist pants. I would like to weigh less than I do but I am not obese. In fact if I were to drop down to the maximum that the doctors say I should weigh I would look rail thin and people would be thinking I am in the last stages of cancer. Actually I believe that the BMI index would indicate that Brad Pitt is very overweight if not indeed obese. I know a young man who regularly runs marathons who is 5 feet and 10 inches tall and weighs 205 pounds, according to his BMI he shouldn’t be able to walk five miles, let alone run 26 miles.
but over 30 BMI...there’s a limit to how much muscle and bone you can build up per a certain height.
Now maybe the formula could take into account shoulder length...I have broad shoulders...I know what this feels :)
Or perhaps another way would be to measure waist size.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/03/050325150149.htm
“Natural selection is only going to weed out those that can’t survive long enough to reproduce. The diseases that obesity causes occur way after people stop having children.”
I was typing too fast. You are correct about this.
It used to be that the weaker and infirm would succumb to different types of infectious diseases, many times in very young ages. That is not the case so much anymore.
But a selection of sorts is taking place at a much older age now. Many people are living with chronic health conditions that take away much of the quality of life, or they are dying early from heart attacks and such. Most of these types of conditions are caused by incorrect nutrition and lifestyle.
well if there is any selection it would probably be in the health care system. So we’ll probably see more insurance companies denying coverage to overweight people.
There simply is no cut-and-dried formula that works for all individuals. I am six four and currently weigh about 265 bone dry and naked as a jaybird. There are doctors walking around who are much lower on the BMI scale who will tell me that I am obese and all the while they have more gut hanging over the belt than I ever have had. I have a younger brother who has a much smaller bone structure and even though he is 2 inches shorter than me he wears jeans with a 36 inseam and I wear 34 inseam. I cannot buy coveralls because they don’t make them long enough between shoulder and crotch to fit me. My brother can weigh 40 pounds less than I weigh and still have more actual fat on him than I do! There are huge variations in the human frame which are not accounted for by BMI. I have seen men who make me look small framed, what are they to do, walk around with every bone showing through the skin?
Check the figures, Mike Tyson was probably obese or nearly so in every fight he ever won if you judge solely by BMI!
There is a simple way to check frame size. If you wrap thumb and index finger around the wrist and the two ovrlap you have a small bone structure, if they just meet you have a medium bone structure, if (as in my case) there is a sizable gap between the tip of the finger and the thumb you have a large bone structure. If you have the large bones, are relatively short legged and long armed as I am and have a large head and thick neck as I do you are going to look like a stick if you are not overweight by the weight charts. I have walked around at a weight of 240 and actually had people ask me how I stayed so skinny! When I was young and actually was within the chart range people made fun of how skinny I was and this was back in the sixties when the heavy people looked skinny compared to most people today!
By the way, at age 63, my blood pressure is usually around 115 over 65 with a resting pulse rate of about 65. Three times a week I go to the local Y and work out for an hour or more in the weight room after a 12 minute warm up on the elliptical trainer. I used to work out for two hours but my wife (age 55) goes with me and she was having to sit and wait for an hour so I cut back. On other days when the temp is not over ninety degrees I like to ride my mountain bike or hike up and down the small hills here (there are no big hills or I would hike them). Does that sound like obesity to you? Be careful how you listen to doctors, they kill a lot of people unintentionally!
Come see me! If you are below the maximum on the weight chart for your height I will carry you around piggyback for a while!
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