Sadly it takes someone as outspoken as food activist and author Michael Pollan to highlight just how misguided the logics on proposed US health reform are.
Pollan notes with absolute conviction that efficiencies in health care reform are irrelevant unless we first face the cause of the unprecedented increase in diet-related, preventable disease … specifically the obesity epidemic.
75% of current US health care expenditure goes towards preventable disease. There has been a 30% increase in these costs in real terms over just the last twenty years.
The US may find themselves in the unenviable position of subsidizing both the cost of diabetes and the production of High Fructose Corn Syrup, which would be a tragic irony.
Obesity currently costs the US health care system about 147 million a year. Add to this the 116 million a year cost of diabetes and the billions spent on cardiovascular disease and related cancers.
All of which could be largely preventable if people just changed their consumption habits.
Of course, this will never happen.
The food manufacturing industry is too powerful and is perhaps matched only by the strength of peoples’ addictions to cooked meat, refined carbohydrates and reconstituted who-knows-what.
Because of the security it provides, we naturally think of the NHS as a wonderful institution here in the United Kingdom.
And yes, in many cases there are people doing miraculous things to save lives and mitigate suffering.
But the NHS is up against the same inexorable tide. Over-consumption of high-calorie/limited nutrient “food” is creating a groundswell of people who are succumbing to premature, preventable disease.
No system, no matter how brilliantly constructed, will be able to remain viable in the long term and meet the future drain on its resources until the truth is faced.
We don’t need more expensive drugs.
We need a total reframe of our consumption culture. And regrettably that is highly unlikely when the top nutritionists in the country are still singing the praises of the grain, dairy and meat industries.
I know people will never give up cooked food. It tastes too good, its addictive allure is subtle yet brutal … and people use cooked meals as the foundation for almost all social interaction.
But people also deserve to know the complete truth about the food they love so much, so that they are at least able to make informed decisions and head in a direction that is more sustainable on a macro basis.
We should be setting agendas aside and calling things as they are.
Then responsible adults can make responsible choices. Until our consumption habits are seen in the same context as smoking, we will continue to kid ourselves that moderation is all that’s needed.
This will provide an endless stream of customers for the pharmaceutical and medical industries and we will never come to the realization that we have everything upside down.
In simple terms, unless the culture changes, the health care system will not cope. Economically, the implications are dire.
Socially, they are even more serious!
