"Healthy Parents have Healthy Children."
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.
"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.
“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
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?