January 2, 2010 Bobby Caina Calvan, Sacramento Bee

Weve resolved to eat better, lace up the running shoes, shed a few pounds, quit smoking and lead healthier lives.

If we could keep our promises beyond the first weekend of the new year, perhaps our health care system wouldnt be as bloated as it is.

Indeed, some of the responsibility for health care costs sits squarely on the shoulders of consumers who make unhealthy choices – by supersizing meals, quenching thirst with sugar-laden sodas, filling lungs with tobacco and taking a less active role in maintaining their overall fitness.

“As important as health reform is, the real answer in reforming Americas health care system is to empower individuals to make better choices about what we eat and how we live,” said Daniel Zingale, a senior vice president at the California Endowment, a health foundation.

While debate remains in Congress over health care legislation, wellness advocates are hopeful that less controversial provisions promoting healthy living will remain in any bill that reaches the presidents desk.

“As preventable illnesses and injuries are the most significant drivers of increasing health care costs,” the Oakland-based Prevention Institute said in a letter to the White House, “it is essential that we reorient our health care system from an after-the-fact approach to one that focuses on keeping people healthy in the first place.”

The House bill includes $34 billion for a public health investment fund, including $15.4 billion for prevention and wellness programs.

The Senate bill is less generous, providing $15 billion for a prevention and public health fund, some of which could be used for so-called community transformation grants to fund parks and urban trails and to promote access to nutrition.

The Senate bill also would establish a national council that takes a broad approach to drafting a health care strategy that integrates transportation, agriculture, education and employment policies. And it would adopt Californias pioneering law requiring fast-food outlets and chain restaurants to provide nutrition information.

“This is the first time in recent history that community and government strategies will align to help support us in the resolutions we make on New Years Day,” said Larry Cohen, the Prevention Institutes executive director.

Wellness and prevention have been “totally lost in the discussion over the health care bill,” Cohen said, “because its … been recognized by both sides as being worthwhile.”

Wellness programs spread

By 2017, U.S. health care could account for $4.3 trillion in annual spending, or a fifth of every dollar spent in the overall economy, according to the National Coalition on Health Care. Much of that could go to preventable conditions linked to obesity, smoking, diabetes and heart disease.

Indirect and direct costs of smoking are now $193 billion a year, about half spent on medical expenses, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In 2007, diabetes accounted for $116 billion. In 2009, heart disease was expected to cost the country $305 billion for care services, medication and lost productivity, according to the CDC.

Obesity costs the nation as much as $147 billion annually, according to a government study released in July.

In California, the national symbol for healthy living, one in every four people is now considered obese. In 1985, when the CDC began measuring the nations expanding girth, 9 percent of the states residents were classified as obese.

“Sugar-sweetened beverages are the single-biggest culprit in the obesity epidemic,” said Harold Goldstein, executive director of the Davis-based California Center for Public Health Advocacy.

“The simplest thing people can do is drink water instead of soda. It would save everybody money in these hard economic times … and it would have a dramatic impact on the obesity epidemic.”

For years, experts have preached healthy living to reduce the rates of chronic conditions.

To save on costs and boost productivity, employers and insurers over the years launched wellness programs to promote healthy habits.

via Better habits can help trim bloated health care system – Health, Fitness & Medical News – sacbee.com.