Your Waistline, Your Dollars

Healthcare reform creates an economic interest in fitness and weight control.

"Rising obesity rates are increasing health care expenditures per person in a way that is going to be very difficult to finance," warns Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a health economist from Stanford University's center for Primary Care and Outcomes Research. The article was found on the front page of Sunday’s edition of the San Francisco Chronicle.

The Chronicle announced startling figures from the Center for Disease Control:

$147 Billion spent on obesity related medical spending in 2008 - US
$15.5 Million Medical costs related to obesity in LA, SF, Alameda and Contra Costa counties in 2006
50 % of CA adults do not exercise enough
33 % of children born in 2000 likely to develop diabetes
30 % of adult Americans are obese
20 is the average number of days a year an obese person is unable to work
16.7% of American children are obese

The facts are becoming more and more clear that their must be an accounting.

Imagine how much money 20 days of your average daily salary would cost you. That's just about one months salary, given that you take weekends off. What could you purchase with that sum of money each year, every year?

Isn’t that sum of money worth 5 hours a week of healthy, purposeful activity?

Begin your own personal health care reform initiative. Set an example for your family and community. Emphasize health reform on a personal level and start the accountability at home.

Author of article in the Chronicle, Carolyn Lochhead at clochhead@sfchronicle.com