LONDON - Preventing obesity and smoking can save lives, but it doesn't save money, researchers reported Monday. It costs more to care for healthy people who live years longer, according to a Dutch study that counters the common perception that preventing obesity would save governments millions of dollars.

In a paper published online Monday in the Public Library of Science Medicine journal, Dutch researchers found that the health costs of thin and healthy people in adulthood are more expensive than those of either fat people or smokers.

Van Baal and colleagues created a model to simulate lifetime health costs for three groups of 1,000 people: the "healthy-living" group (thin and non-smoking), obese people, and smokers. The model relied on "cost of illness" data and disease prevalence in the Netherlands in 2003.

The researchers found that from age 20 to 56, obese people racked up the most expensive health costs. But because both the smokers and the obese people died sooner than the healthy group, it cost less to treat them in the long run.

On average, healthy people lived 84 years. Smokers lived about 77 years, and obese people lived about 80 years. Smokers and obese people tended to have more heart disease than the healthy people.

Cancer incidence, except for lung cancer, was the same in all three groups. Obese people had the most diabetes, and healthy people had the most strokes. Ultimately, the thin and healthy group cost the most, about $417,000, from age 20 on.

The cost of care for obese people was $371,000, and for smokers, about $326,000.

The results counter the common perception that preventing obesity will save health systems worldwide
millions of dollars.

This throws a bucket of cold water onto the idea that obesity is going to cost trillions of dollars," said Patrick Basham, a professor of health politics at Johns Hopkins University who was unconnected to the study. He said that government projections about obesity costs are frequently based on guesswork, political agendas, and changing science



http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080205/ap_on_he_me/obesity...XanRb1YZw4nEk8Cs0NUE

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The results counter the common perception that preventing obesity(AND SMOKING) will save health systems worldwide
millions of dollars.

Sooooo, more people being exposed to SHS and 'Second Hand Obesity' WILL SAVE health systems worldwide millions of dollars.

Gary K.

Smoke more, ...it's good for the bottom line.

It would be interesting to know what was included in the "model". It is the small words in these reports that make a difference.

If you take an average of $ 400,000 over 60 year it works out to be less than half what these people pay in health insurance premiums or $ 6,700 per year.

If you look at a healthy person living to 83, how many replacement parts have been installed and how much was spent on prescription drugs?

What was the profit margins supported on these figures?

The medical profession is currently on a spending spree to build facilities to treat the "boomers" in their later years, is this speculation? What is the cost of this speculation?

At the same time, how much is being spent to combat childhood mortality?

Which group will actually be paying the bills?

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If you look at a healthy person living to 83, how many replacement parts have been installed and how much was spent on prescription drugs?

Prescription drugs are a huge part of this cost, but so is nursing care, nursing homes, and assisted living.

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What was the profit margins supported on these figures?

This is difficult to answer without narrowing it down to a specific line of business. Also, many health insurers and other agencies have "not-for-profit" status, though that doesn't necessarily mean "not-for-money". In my state, health insurers are the #1 lobbying group in terms of dollars spent.

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The medical profession is currently on a spending spree to build facilities to treat the "boomers" in their later years, is this speculation? What is the cost of this speculation?

What you may be witnessing, in reality, is real estate investment. Ray Kroc of McDonald's once famously said that he wasn't in the hamburger business, but the commercial real estate business.

I've also heard that if you want to know who is making money, look at who is building. In my area, over the past 10 to 15 years, I've noticed this to be banks, chain pharmacies, health care facilities, health insurance companies, senior living facilities, churches, and Dunkin' Donuts.

quote:

At the same time, how much is being spent to combat childhood mortality?

The leading killers of (born) children are, I believe, accidents, murder and suicide. I would imagine that great amounts of money are spent on children with diseases, for the understandable emotional factor involved. Of course, it's also a reasonable factor, as these children have the greatest amount of productive years to lose.

Unfortunately, due to the political climate we currently live, my defenses go up when children are brought into the equation, where most simply open their heart, usually at the expense of their reason.

(On an aside, it occurs to me that nature is nastier to children than other human beings are. If they make it through childbirth and through their first years, nature hormonally downloads a whole new set of programming into them at puberty without an emotional guidebook to deal with their new feelings, thoughts and emotions. I've heard that this emotional set stays in place until our early to mid-twenties, and that our brains actually undergo a chemical change at that point. For me, this explained how I couldn't pass up a weekend night out to being perfectly content at home reading a book in only a couple of years. Anyway, that period from puberty until the early to mid-twenties seems to be the time that young people see external reactions to them as reason to drive like maniacs, blow their head off, or drink themselves into oblivion.)

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