Posted on 05/28/2009 7:32:39 PM PDT by neverdem
Even with swine flu in the news, the selection of a new director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) would not normally be a big story. The appointment has made headlines, however, because President Obamas choice, New York City health commissioner Thomas Frieden, has already made a name for himself as a vocal critic of fast food, soda, and cigarettes. Dr. Frieden is certainly qualified for the CDC spot: he once logged nearly 12 years at that agency, as well as two years in India studying tuberculosis for the World Health Organization. But his impact in New York has been questionable.
In his tenure as the citys health commissioner, Frieden transformed the office, generating national attention for his ideas, initiatives, and bombastic commentshe once likened tobacco-company executives to mass murderers. He spearheaded an effort to distribute millions of free condoms (with a snappy-looking New Yorkthemed cover design), successfully pushed a ban on smoking in restaurants, and, more recently, championed the effort to force some eateries to post calorie listings. Whereas health commissioners typically toil in obscurityquick, name a single memorable initiative of Chicago health commissioner Terry MasonFrieden is a national figure. Cities across the country are implementing or at least contemplating his proposals. Even before he starts his new job, his influence is being felt in Congress: the Senate Finance Committee is considering using the soda tax that he touts as a way to fund universal health coverage.
But was his seven-year stint in New York successful? We can all agree that Americans are decidedly unhealthy. Obesity rates on this side of the Atlantic are much higher than in Europe, which is one reason why Americans life expectancy trails Europeans. Fully 20 percent of the rise in health-care costs from now until 2020 will be due to obesity and related illnesses. Frieden didnt simply bemoan the widening of New Yorkers waistlines; he sought to do something about it. As Georges Benjamin, the executive director of the American Public Health Association, told the Los Angeles Times, Frieden has been at the forefront of dealing with cutting-edge issues . . . such as diet, smoking and lack of exercise. Those are exactly the things that are driving up our health costs.
Frieden favors small, paternalistic measures, and for cash-strapped cities like New York, such measures seem like an inexpensive way to fight the war on obesity. Unfortunately, there is little evidence that they work. Consider the calorie listings at restaurants. In a study of more than 4,000 people published in The American Journal of Public Health, just 0.1 percent of the subjects actually looked at the calorie counts before deciding what to eat. Does anyone order a chocolate shake at McDonalds and assume that its healthful? Undaunted by the results, researchers suggested that perhaps the signage needed to be larger.
Frieden in fact represents the old guard of public health. Awed by the success of the antismoking campaigns of the sixties and seventies, he and his colleagues believe that todays public health problems can be resolved with yesterdays tactic: education initiatives. For more promising, forward-looking alternatives, consider North Carolina, where lawmakers enacted several wellness initiatives last month for state employees. Among them: higher insurance costs for smokers and the obese. Faced with a budgetary shortfall, the state has realized that those with smoking or weight problems cost roughly $2,000 more per year to insure than those without. North Carolinas experiment is new, but it represents a return to an old idea: personal responsibility. By reinstilling this value in our public policy, lawmakers will get better results than anything Frieden has dreamed up in New York.
Dr. David Gratzer, a physician, is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.
Good grief. The world is faces such devastating and deadly diseases as Ebola, Hantavirus, eColi, malaria and a host of weaponized biological agents, and Barry hires a soft-drink “expert” to run the CDC.
.............but he’s empathetic.
Well, that’s just what we need running our national health agencies: a gang of abortionists,cigarette grabbers, and label control freaks.
Does anyone order a chocolate shake at McDonalds and assume that its healthful?
I always read the healt notice when I’m eating my Double Whopper, it makes me realize I’m getting my moneys worth.
Zero accomplishments?
Now if only he had some fraudulent tax returns, he’d be a PERFECT fit in Zero’s Cabinet!
New York City health commissioner Thomas Frieden, has already made a name for himself as a vocal critic of fast food, soda, and cigarettes.Thanks neverdem.
“Fully 20 percent of the rise in health-care costs from now until 2020 will be due to obesity and related illnesses. “
I don’t believe it. This is a BS not provable number. And all the talk about preventable illness coming from a smoking cheeseburger eating President is hypocritical.
How much of NY health costs come from anal sex? Why doesn’t Dr Buttinsky ban that?
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